The Gritty Virtual Assistant

I came across a Virtual Assistant’s website whose rates page went something like this:

“Compared to most Virtual Assistants who charge $35-70 per hour, I am dirt cheap and will only charge $12 per hour on most projects.”

Oh lawdy, lawdy, lawdy… There are so many things wrong with this message and I have two minds on the subject.

On the one hand, this is obviously someone brand-spanking new who doesn’t yet understand what Virtual Assistance is, who is still operating under the misguided notion that a Virtual Assistant is an employee (hence the below-par employee wage-level rate), who has no education yet about how to successfully operate and market a business, and who desperately needs some helpful guidance—because at that rate, that Virtual Assistant is not only going to not make any money, especially doing project work, but she will quickly be taken advantage of and burn out in the process.

On the other hand (and I will be somewhat charitable because I think there’s probably no way she even thought of it from this perspective), but that whole statement is incredibly, abominably insulting to her colleagues and the rest of the Virtual Assistant industry–from whom she is most probably in the habit of seeking advice from at the same time she is denigrating them.

So, consider this viewpoint… if you are going to undercut your colleagues, operate at a loss, miseducate our marketplace, undermine the industry, and create the unrealistic expectation in clients that $35-70 per hour is somehow unprofessional or too expensive, then also please be prepared to stop asking those same colleagues for advice, mentoring and support. It is completely ill-mannered and offensive.

I know you are new. This is one of the most supportive industries you will find, and many successful veterans, like myself, will help you in any way we can. So please do understand that I’m not trying to be mean; I want to wake you up and get you to start thinking.

So what are the nitty gritty problems with this:

1. This is someone calling themselves a Virtual Assistant who doesn’t yet understand what Virtual Assistance truly is. Virtual Assistance is not project work done here and there; that is a secretarial service. What Virtual Assistants are in the business of providing is ongoing, continuous administrative support. 

Your understanding about what you are and what you are in the business of providing is going to be critical to your ability to market attractively and create sustainable, profitable earnings. 

To get that understanding about what Virtual Assistance is and the difference between a Virtual Assistant and a secretarial service, read the VACOC Home page, as well as the History of Virtual Assistance and the VACOC Outsourcing Glossary. Heck, you should probably read the Client’s Guide to Virtual Assistants while you’re at it.

2. Running a business is a completely different animal than being an employee. You can’t operate a business and make a real income, much less sustain the business, if you think and operate like an employee and don’t charge appropriately. You’re going to have to start eduating yourself about business and being a business owner. That could start with getting a clear understanding about the difference between an employee and a Virtual Assistant.

3. I can almost guarantee this Virtual Assistant has done no business planning or used any business formularies to set her rates profitably and professionally. If you do nothing else, download the VACOC’s free automated Excel Service Pricing Worksheet so you can get a smarter, more informed idea of what it really costs to run your professional business and what kind of rate you’ll need to charge in order to sustain the business, pay yourself a salary and (gasp!) even create profit!

You should also purchase the VACOC Virtual Assistant Business Plan Template. This isn’t someone’s sloppy, generic, poor excuse of a business plan. This is my personal, 18-page, proven success plan that outlines my complete model for creating a six-figure solo Virtual Assistant practice. It is fully customizable and includes four Excel financial worksheets as well as a service rate calculation tool.

It’s designed to help you better understand the business you are in and how to create multiple revenue streams at every level in addition to your one-on-one administrative support.

4.  It screams to potential clients, “Hey, I’m a cheap dummy. I don’t know the first thing about running a business and charging appropriately. PLEASE, I’m desperate, don’t know any better and this is your red-carpeted, personal invitation to come and totally take advantage of my ignorance.”

This is absolutely the wrong way to attract clients. You aren’t in business to give away your work, but that’s exactly what you’d be doing at those kind of unprofitable rates. In fact, it will attract all the worst sort of clients: the demanding nitpickers, the cheapskates, the scope creepers, the late payers, the non-payers, the I-want-it-all-and-I-want-it-now-but-I-don’t-want-to-pay-for-it clients and all other various manner of nightmare, PIA clients; the kind of clients that will make you regret ever going into business in the first place.

You simply can’t afford to work with the wrong kind of clients who don’t want to pay fully appropriate and professional rates. Your business will not survive. You will quickly go broke and burn out trying to keep up. 

Low rates is also not the way to get good, quality, wonderful-to-work with clients who will value you and your work. It’s actually a form of bribery. It’s saying, I have nothing of any real substance to offer and the only way I can get clients to work with me is to bribe them with low rates.

Worse, it is a bright, neon-lit sign that tells the world you don’t have any confidence in your skills or the value they offer to clients and their businesses. Mark my words, if YOU don’t value and respect what you have to offer, no client will either.

It’s also a never-ending cycle of sabotage when you base your marketing message on low rates (and really, your marketing should never be about your price, but that’s a different post). Those who only come to you because you’re cheap are always going to want “cheap.” You will be nothing more than a commodity to them and they will forever be asking you for more discounts, more bargains, more freebies and more give-ins.

And there will always be someone else out there (who also doesn’t get it) willing to do it even cheaper. So then what do you do? Start working for free? Oh wait, you’re basically already doing that.

I know you don’t really want to go down that road. But it’s going to take more than knowing that you don’t. You’re going to have to start thinking and becoming conscious. It will require you to be smarter in business, to educate yourself about marketing and pricing (and the marketing message your rate sends), to fully understand your real value to clients, and in the process gain the confidence you need to run your own show and charge appropriately and profitably. 

Some of that is going to necessarily have to begin with getting over some of the social and cultural hang-ups most women suffer from in business. My favorite expert for helping women overcome employee mindset and gaining the confidence to start charging their worth is Mikelann Valterra, director of the Women’s Earning Institute. Get thee over to her website and sign up for her newsletter and subscribe to her blog. You simply must do this now!

And for an entire process of getting clear about the business you’re in, identifying your target market, profiling your ideal client AND gaining a clear, unmitigated understanding of your value to clients and crafting your marketing message, be sure to get my workbook, “Understanding Your Value: How to Craft Your Own Unique Value Proposition and Cash-In on Value-Billing Methodologies.”

You do the exercises included in the book to help you tighten up your thinking and craft your marketing and you will never have to bribe anyone to work with you for peanuts ever again.