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ОглавлениеFinding and Hiring Your Virtual Staff
There aren’t too many differences between finding and hiring virtual workers and doing the same with employees that will be based in your office. However, the differences that do exist are important to understand.
There’s a lot to cover in this section, and we’ll focus particularly on the following topics:
• understanding the myth of the super-VA (and busting it!)
• how creating your “3 Lists to Freedom” will change everything
• the different types of virtual workers and how they can help you
• how and where to find the right virtual staff
• ten interview questions you need to ask when hiring
Before you dive in, let’s get a general overview of the game and learn about the ins and outs of the playing field.
Just like in sports, we need to begin with the fundamentals. Once you understand these principles, you can tailor your approach to streamline the process. And this is a process—one that should be followed step by step.
Here are the basic rules of the game:
1. Your virtual workers are people, not a program. Though communication with your virtual staff takes place via e-mail and web-based audio and/or video chat services like Skype, VAs still deserve the same respect you would give any human being. It’s in your best interest to understand each worker’s communication customs and to be aware of his or her cultural holidays and traditions.
2. Put quality in, get quality out. The quality of work you receive from virtual employees is proportional to the quality of the instructions they receive. Are your instructions clear and concise? Or are you giving them a jumbled mess of instructions and hoping they can connect the dots?
3. One size does not fit all. All VAs have strengths and weaknesses, but they may not want to tell you that. They want to please you and will try to figure out ways to do whatever you want. This is a double-edged sword. Take care to match the right VA to each of your needs. We’ll go into this in a lot more detail.
4. Super-VAs don’t exist. There is no one virtual assistant anywhere on the planet who can handle everything you need help with in your business. Think about it: When your roof is leaking, you don’t ask your electrician to pop around and fix it. You call a roofing expert to come over and do the necessary repairs. This is one of the biggest myths in virtual staffing so I will discuss this in more detail below, but bottom line: hire for the role, not for the task.
Now that you know the rules of the game, we can get to work!
Reality Check: The Myth of the Super-VA
The idea of a super-VA is the big kahuna—the one mistake that I see entrepreneurs who are getting started with outsourcing make over and over again. Read these words carefully: there’s no such thing as a super-VA. It drives me crazy when an entrepreneur sets out to find that one special VA who can do all of the work in his or her business. I can’t tell you how many requests we receive at Virtual Staff Finder from entrepreneurs who are looking for VAs who can handle all of the following tasks and more:
• update blog posts
• manage social media
• edit video
• transcribe audio
• create custom images and icons
• design and develop websites
• respond to customer support tickets
• research and recruit affiliates
• do Amazon shopping for birthday gifts for loved ones
There’s nothing wrong with trying to outsource a scattered group of tasks and projects, but a single VA is not your answer. As a business owner, I can relate to the multiple hats entrepreneurs need to wear in order to get things done. However, filling your business with more entrepreneurial types who also think that they can do it all is the last thing you should do. Your focus needs to shift from finding a super-VA to identifying the specific roles your business needs to fill.
Remember, empire-building equals team-building—and you have to identify the positions your team needs before you begin recruiting the players.
Introducing the General Virtual Assistant (GVA)
I’ve had the pleasure of speaking on stage and working with business owners from all around the world on the subject of virtual staffing and outsourcing. No matter where I am or who I’m working with, my basic message remains the same: Every entrepreneur needs a GVA!
Even though the super-VA doesn’t exist, the general virtual assistant is about as close to one as you can get. They can’t wear all of the different VA hats out there, but GVAs will help you run your life and maximize your productivity by freeing you of time-draining, repetitive tasks that no business owner should be handling. Your GVA is your sidekick. Batman had Robin. Sherlock Holmes had Watson. Hardy had Laurel. Michael Jordan had Scottie Pippen.
Working with a GVA is the first step to realizing the power of virtual staffing. Your GVA will immediately begin saving you time and allowing you to work on your business instead of being trapped working in it.
Are you struggling to stay up to date with or roll out the following types of tasks on a regular basis?
• researching competitors’ websites for lists of products and prices
• compiling a list of local events that you could sponsor or where you could exhibit
• combing your blog’s analytics to find out which pages or blog posts are receiving the most traffic
• keeping your social media channels updated and interesting for followers
• getting featured in local, national, and industry-related press
• transcribing your online videos and podcast episodes to use as future e-books and in info-graphics to promote your products and services
• keeping your calendar updated so you don’t miss an important golf date with your top client
Delegating these small tasks begins freeing up extra time for you each day. Ten minutes here and thirty minutes there can add up quickly. Delegating also gets rid of all those unresolved items you’re carrying around in your head. As David Allen points out in his book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity, this is one of the critical factors that will allow you to focus.
“Your conscious mind, like a computer screen, is a focusing tool, not a storage place,” he writes. “You can think about only two or three things at once. But the incomplete items are being stored in the short-term memory space. And as with RAM (random access memory), there’s limited capacity; there’s only so much ‘stuff’ you can store in there and still have that part of your brain functioning at a high level. Most people walk around with their RAM bursting at the seams.”
It’s crazy how many things you’re probably juggling in your head right now. But it’s stuff that needs to get done, right? So it has to go somewhere. This is where your superhero syndrome begins to kick in, leading you into thinking that working harder is the solution. But again, the real solution is not longer hours—it’s leverage.
As entrepreneurs, time is our most valuable commodity (MVC). Money will come and go, but once you’ve invested your time into something, that time is gone forever. It stands to reason that if there are any actions we can take as business owners to free up more time in our daily routines, we should take them.
Hiring and working with a GVA will help you do just that. Think of your GVA as a personal assistant (PA). Aside from bringing you a cup of coffee or picking up your dry cleaning, GVAs can do all the same tasks that an old-fashioned, in-office PA could handle.
Here are just a few of the tasks a GVA can take off your plate so you have more space in your mind and in your workday:
• perform online research
• make online purchases (have the GVA use a prepaid credit card with a small amount you can fund and monitor each month)
• update your calendar
• make a dinner reservation
• draft your latest blog post or upload your YouTube videos
• send your spouse a gift
• or, if you’re single, send e-mails to potential dates on Match.com or eHarmony—yes, really!
• update your Facebook status with prewritten posts
• order more business cards
• collate a list of articles from online news sources and e-mail you with a weekly update
• send a follow-up e-mail or letter to new contacts you just met at that conference you attended
• book your biannual dental cleanings and then update them on your calendar
You’ll see that this list is just the beginning of how a GVA can help you achieve freedom on a day-to-day basis. Furthermore, the GVA role is just one of many different types of virtual workers that are out there and ready to be put on your team. The question is, what else can you get virtual assistants to do for you?
You’re about to find out, thanks to a very simple, quick, and effective exercise.
Creating Your 3 Lists to Freedom
Your first step toward freedom in any situation is to begin identifying exactly which tasks you want freedom from—and the types of workers you’ll need to handle those tasks. This is why at my speaking engagements, in podcast interviews, and even in traditional press appearances on the subject of virtual staffing, I always include my 3 Lists to Freedom exercise. It’s incredibly eye-opening, and it gives everyone a customized list of activities to work from as we move along.
Before you start putting together your three lists, let’s consider all of the activities you’ll need to incorporate. First, take a moment to think about all of the activities your business needs just to maintain itself—these are the day-to-day tasks such as customer service. Next, consider all of the activities needed to grow your business; this might include content creation, for example. Then, go through and highlight the items that you enjoy doing personally. Now you’re ready to create your 3 Lists to Freedom.
1. Tasks You Don’t Like Doing
This is any task that makes you cringe or procrastinate. Anything can be on this list—except for selling. Selling needs to be one of your top priorities because it’s the lifeblood of any business, and no one should know your product or service better than you.
Do you routinely reply to customer service e-mails, perhaps answering the most basic of inquiries? Are you still laying out and formatting your own blog posts? Does this stuff drive you nuts? Put those types of things on this list.
Australian-based James Schramko is one of the most popular Internet marketers operating online today. He is incredibly successful. James started working with virtual assistants to simply handle work that he didn’t want to do himself anymore. The result is SuperfastBusiness.com, an extremely systemized online offering with well over fifty (yes, you read that correctly) VAs running his business for him around the clock.
2. Tasks You Don’t Know How to Do
Be honest with yourself. Don’t let superhero syndrome kick in here. I remember trying to design and develop my first blog on my own using a premium theme. It took me eight hours of work, and I still wasn’t happy with it. Why? Because I’m not a bloody web developer, that’s why!
Sit back and genuinely think hard about this one. Ask yourself questions such as
• Are there tasks you’re currently doing that could be completed faster by someone else?
• Are there projects you’re handling that could be wrapped up in a better, more professional way?
• Are you trying to cut costs by dabbling far outside your areas of expertise?
Business coach and podcaster Jaime Tardy hired VAs to manage the web development and online marketing side of her business, EventualMillionaire.com. Why? Because she simply didn’t know how to do it herself and admitted the fact, instead of trying to teach herself.
3. Tasks You Feel You Shouldn’t Be Doing
This is the list I want you to give the most thought to. It’s usually a huge eye-opener for business owners because it gets their internal wheels turning about how they’re currently running their businesses. More importantly, this list helps you see how you want to be running your business in the future.
Some questions to ponder:
• Which tasks should you simply never touch—meaning you could eliminate them from your schedule entirely, making way for more important tasks?
• Which low-level tasks could be easily given to a virtual assistant as part-time work?
• Which tasks are you handling that could be taken over by a professional who knows exactly what he or she is doing? These are tasks where the potential harm outweighs the cost savings of doing them yourself.
• Which tasks are stopping you from really focusing on the strategic growth of your business?
Mediapreneur David Siteman Garland was bogged down handling every tiny detail in his online media business, TheRiseToTheTop.com. Realizing that he needed more time to focus on the most important things, such as building relationships and further monetizing his blog and online brand, he turned to virtual help. He gained countless hours back into his schedule and today has one of the most popular online TV shows for entrepreneurs.
Here’s an example of how your lists might look, as you start out with the exercise. Note: This is standard stuff and generic to entrepreneurs everywhere in today’s business world. Your lists should be focused on you and your specific needs as a business owner.
| List #1Don’t Like Doing | List #2Can’t Do | List #3Shouldn’t Do |
| Checking E-mail | Developing Website | Updating Facebook Page |
| Managing Social Media | Editing Podcast Episodes | Handling Tier 1 Support |
| Handling Basic Inquiries | Designing Logos & Graphics | Transcribing Online Video |
| Researching Travel Options | Bookkeeping & Accounts | Managing Company Blog |
| List #1Don’t Like Doing | List #2Can’t Do | List #3Shouldn’t Do |
| Checking E-mail | Developing Website | Updating Facebook Page |
| Managing Social Media | Editing Podcast Episodes | Handling Tier 1 Support |
| Handling Basic Inquiries | Designing Logos & Graphics | Transcribing Online Video |
| Researching Travel Options | Bookkeeping & Accounts | Managing Company Blog |
Keep your 3 Lists to Freedom handy: We’ll be coming back to them quite regularly.
If you’d like to see a video version of this exercise, head over to ChrisDucker.com/3Lists
You now have a foundation of tasks that are easily delegated that will continue to grow over time, as they do for most entrepreneurs today—not only that, but through the 3 Lists to Freedom exercise you’ve deepened your understanding of yourself and the types of tasks you need to delegate. This is essential to your success. With that in mind, let’s discuss how to find and hire the people who are going to help revolutionize the way you run and grow your business going forward.
This is where I begin leading you down the path to virtual freedom, distilling almost ten years of outsourcing experience into a bite-size training system that will revolutionize your personal and professional life.
But before we dive in, I need you to make me a promise. I want you to promise that before you incorporate a single virtual staff member into your workflow or hire additional staff, you will first commit to reading at least the first and second sections of this book. These sections have been specifically designed to point you in the right direction, and they will give you the solid foundation you’ll need to build on.
Sure, you might stumble every now and then, but how quickly you pick yourself up and dust yourself off will depend on you consuming the content in these first couple of sections. In my experience, there are two solid reasons why your virtual staffing empire could crumble:
1. You build around one strong person instead of building a team with specific roles. This is an easy trap to fall into when you find a VA who works exceptionally well for you. You may think your VA will always be with you and start building around his or her strengths instead of focusing on building a team. I truly value the longevity of my staff, but I would never put my company in a position where it would be completely destroyed if I lost someone. Each role within your organization should be clearly defined, and you should know exactly what you would do if someone decided to quit or if you needed to let someone go. Life must carry on.
2. You fail to properly train your team. Training is the foundation of your success with virtual assistants. You’ll learn how to handle this part of the journey in Section 2 of this book.
I want to ensure that you don’t make either of those mistakes.
Understanding the 2 Different Types of Outsourcing
In order to simplify things, think of outsourcing as falling into two different categories: project-based outsourcing and role-based outsourcing.
• Project-based outsourcing is used when a business needs just one task or one project completed. This might be a simple task like creating a logo or installing an auto-responder form on a website, or it could be a more detailed project like creating an e-commerce site or a mobile app.
• Role-based outsourcing involves finding someone to fill a particular role within your business on a part-time or full-time basis. In role-based outsourcing, the VA becomes a member of your team. In order for this to make financial sense, you’ll need to have enough work to justify paying someone regularly to perform these tasks.
The upside to having a full-time or part-time employee on your team is the speed at which you’ll be able to implement everything you want to do. But what if you don’t have enough work or revenue to support a full-time or part-time virtual employee?
Great question. For now, you’ll need to work with a project-based mindset but keep a long-term perspective. This means each task you outsource is an opportunity to
• Learn how to properly communicate the work you want to delegate. Save any correspondence or media that could be used to train future VAs. There’s no reason to reinvent the wheel.
• Find a VA you might want to work with in the future on a part-time or full-time basis. Some of the best working relationships will arise out of working on smaller tasks together. Keep an eye out for promising talent that you’d like to bring on board in the future.
Whether you start on a smaller scale with freelancers on a task-by-task basis or you get started with a team of part-time or full-time workers, one thing is for sure—you had better understand who should be doing what for you.
Jared Croslow is a brilliant marketer. A true entrepreneur, through and through. His thirst for building businesses, creating great products and services, and generally helping everyone he comes into contact with is second to none.
The Problem
When I first spoke with Jared in 2011, he was working with five full-time VAs on various ventures, including his Internet marketing blog, Cliconomics.com. On more than one occasion, Jared realized that although he was certainly not short on staff, he was short on projects and tasks for them to work on. Even with the support that he had in place, Jared was operating his business on what he now calls the “just in time” model, where he would stress himself out trying to come up with tasks for his staff to do—aptly capturing the anxiety that comes along with trying to manage every aspect of your business by yourself. He now recognizes that this is not a healthy, successful way to go about business; in fact, it’s a good way to exhaust yourself and make mistakes due to a lack of expertise.
The Solution
Jared decided to switch up his business plan and hire VAs on a task-by-task basis. He now operates his business using what he calls the “just in case” model. This model entails hiring several part-time VAs to do the necessary work but only when it needs to be done. For example, he has hired VAs to aid in the design and development of a new tactic—hiring simply “just in case” he needs to.
The Outcome
Jared’s business is far more successful since he has made this shift in the way that he runs his virtual staffing plans—and his VAs are far more satisfied with their productivity.
Defining the Different Types of Virtual Workers
The moment you experience the power of a specialized, well-trained team of VAs, you’ll have access to one of the most powerful assets any entrepreneur can wish for—more time.
Just imagine what it would be like to have more time to work on your business instead of constantly working in the business. In order to get there, you must first begin by defining the roles your business needs to fill.
This is where your answers from the 3 Lists to Freedom exercise will come in handy. See, I told you we’d be seeing that again! My recommendation is to continually refer back to this list and use it as the framework for building your virtual team. When it comes to building a real team of your own, a team that becomes just as important to your business as the very customers that it serves, I consistently use the mantra, “Hire for the role, not for the task.”
Let’s take a look at the various VA roles, including typical duties within these roles and some rough pay scales. To make things easy to follow, keep in mind that these pay scales reflect a full-time (eight hours a day, Monday through Friday) position for an overseas virtual assistant. I’ve decided to base the figures on Filipino VAs because that’s the demographic I know personally, so please keep this in mind as well.
For part-time roles, simply cut the salary guidelines in half. Please note, however, that almost all virtual workers I’ve come across, both domestic and overseas, are much more interested in full-time positions than part-time ones.
The following are the primary roles that we’ll be discussing throughout the book. All of these are roles that both online entrepreneurs and more traditional brick-and-mortar business owners can use when marketing and growing their businesses in today’s economy.
• general virtual assistant (GVA)
• web developer
• graphic designer
• SEO (search engine optimization)/Internet marketing VA
• content writer
• video editor
• app developer
1. General Virtual Assistant (GVA)
As I’ve mentioned already, I’m a firm believer that every entrepreneur needs a GVA. Even if you already have a personal assistant, I recommend using a general virtual assistant as well. Not only are GVAs extremely affordable at a starting rate of around $3.50 per hour—which means they can do the lower level online work you’ve been giving to your personal assistant—but they’re also a great way to get accustomed to the idea of virtual staffing. Trust me, it’s not as scary as you think.
Pay Scale: $500 to $900 per month
Examples of Typical Duties
• Research keywords and topics.
• Maintain social media and post status updates.
• Manage your calendar, including travel and daily meetings.
• Upload blog posts and help with publishing schedules.
• Make small purchases, equipped with a prepaid credit card.
• Create and manage reports for website sales and product shipping.
• Check in with other team members, almost like a project manager. (We’ll discuss this role a little later on.)
2. Web Developer
These virtual workers are incredibly skilled and typically self-taught. They can create every type of website from basic brochure-style pages to fully functional e-commerce sites.
Consider the web developer VA as a digital contractor who keeps your web presence relevant, attractive, and functional. Without a solid web developer, you’ll soon find yourself with a site that becomes stale and lacks the content you need to gain higher rankings. However, keep in mind that a web developer is not responsible for designing your website. The developer’s job is to bring your site to life with the proper coding and to maintain its functionality.
Pay Scale: $600 to $1,500 per month
Examples of Typical Duties
• Install and customize blog and website themes.
• Install shopping cart and “buy now” buttons.
• Create e-commerce sites.
• Create membership sites.
• Maintain backups and make sure software and plug-ins are all up to date.
• Work with PHP and other scary programming languages.
Don’t worry if you don’t understand some of the terms above. You don’t have to understand the terminology to benefit from a web developer’s skills—trust me, I know!
3. Graphic Designer
Not to be confused with your web developer, your graphic designer VA will be in charge of creating customized graphics for both offline and online marketing.
Pay Scale: $600 to $1,500 per month
Examples of Typical Duties
• Create logos and business cards.
• Design product images and retail packaging.
• Make 3-D images for video.
• Customize web icons and buttons.
• Design original websites and create new concepts.
4. SEO (Search Engine Optimization)/Internet Marketing VA
The world of SEO is a rapidly changing environment. That means that only those professionals who stay plugged into what’s going on can offer lasting results to their clients and employees. What does that mean in plain English? It means that what may have worked last year will probably be less effective or not work at all today.
For example, on April 24, 2012, Google introduced Penguin, an algorithm update that was designed to decrease the rankings of websites that violated Google’s Webmaster Guidelines by using duplicate content, keyword stuffing, and other “black-hat” techniques to gain higher rankings.
Perhaps your SEO strategy never involved these kinds of tactics—but even if it didn’t, there are constant changes to search-engine algorithms that will affect your ranking. This is why it’s essential for you to partner with an SEO VA who can implement the most current strategies.
This virtual assistant will help you optimize your online content, which we’ll discuss at great length in Section 6. Since the world of SEO changes so quickly, it’s important to make sure your SEO VA is consistently educating himself or herself to stay up to date with any changes that will affect your website’s ranking.
Pay Scale: $600 to $1,000 per month
Examples of Typical Duties
• Optimize page titles, meta descriptions, and keywords.
• Interlink content throughout your site.
• Perform off-site SEO tactics like link building and social bookmarking.
• Research keywords by searching for and making regular lists of common industry search terms, helping you to focus more on your content creation.
• Maintain content across all online properties.
5. Content Writer
Your content writer is a person who loves to read and write and is good at both. It’s quite easy to find someone overseas who is directly out of college with a degree in Mass Communications, Hotel and Restaurant Management, or Nursing. These degrees reflect the fact that they studied in English and have a good command of the language. However, be selective of the pieces of content you choose to outsource. I recommend that you create yourself any content that will have your name attached to it.
Pay Scale: $400 to $700 per month
Examples of Typical Duties
• Write 500- to 1,200-word blog posts.
• Create descriptions of podcasts (also known as “show notes”).
• Write press releases.
• Research, outline, and write e-books and white-papers.
• Write website content. However, I suggest that you never outsource the writing of your “About” page. The owner of the blog or business should always write this page.
• Read through articles and books you recommend to come up with similar content ideas.
• Upload articles to blogs. Not all writers will be able to do this initially, but it is an easy skill you can train your writer to do, particularly if your site runs on an easy-to-use platform like WordPress.
6. Video Editor
Due to the increasing popularity of online video marketing, I’ve seen a huge spike in demand for VAs who have post-production skills and are familiar with the various video marketing platforms out there. If you’re not using video in your current marketing strategy, consider the following statistics specific to YouTube, keeping in mind that there are also plenty of other video sharing sites online.
• YouTube receives more than one billion unique users each month.
• More than four billion hours of video are watched on YouTube each month. It’s like eating a potato chip—once you start, it’s impossible to have just one!
• Seventy-two hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute.
Now I know many late adopters might consider YouTube to be that place where people go to escape reality by watching dancing cats and cute babies. While that’s still true, people are also going to YouTube to be educated. They’re searching for everything from “how to fix a flat tire” to “which camera should I buy?”
Don’t worry—you don’t need a film degree or expensive equipment to produce high-quality videos that are engaging. In fact, the camera built into your smartphone can produce incredible footage that, if properly edited, could start driving targeted traffic to your website, which could lead to your next client or your next spike in sales.
A video editor VA can combine your raw footage with audio effects, video effects, and processing effects (similar to, but a little more complex than the Instagram filters you might use to make your iPhone photos look better) to produce a high-quality video that will leave you saying, “Did I really shoot that on my phone?”
For an example of the type of videos you can create with a simple iPhone 5 and a video editor VA, visit ChrisDucker.com/SuperVAMyth
With video editor VAs, there is a big difference in pay scales based on experience level and the quantity of effects and animation you want.
Pay Scale: $800 to $2,000 per month
Examples of Typical Duties
• Splice and edit raw video files.
• Integrate different clips and transitions to keep your audience entertained.
• Add music and other audio effects, such as zingers.
• Incorporate special effects, such as animated text. This is only necessary if it helps enhance your story or move it along. Using effects just for the heck of it will only serve as a distraction.
• Upload videos. Once edited and approved, your editor can make sure your video is properly uploaded to YouTube and other video-sharing sites.
7. App Developer
The world of mobile apps contains two schools of thought. Some believe mobile apps are just a trend that will one day become a thing of the past. Others see mobile apps as the future of mobile web browsing and even business in general.
Which is correct? As of right now, we don’t know. But one thing’s for sure—mobile app creation, marketing, and purchasing are all on the rise. This means that business owners must ask themselves if they want to participate and strike while the consumer buzz is hot or stick to traditional methods of interaction.
Just as for video editing, there are plenty of free tools online that allow users to create an app for next to nothing or even for free. However, I would caution you against pursuing free tools, especially when it comes to creating a user experience for your brand.
Pay Scale: $1,000 to $2,500 per month. Please note that this particular salary rate is changing at a rapid pace and is best set as a per-project payment rather than an hourly or monthly one.
Examples of Typical Duties
• Create initial design and layout options for the app.
• Build an app wireframe to show how the app will work.
• Program in various languages such as JavaScript, PHP, jQuery, Node.js, MySQL, and many more.
• Test app on various devices, such as iOS, Android, and BlackBerry, to confirm compatibility.
• Submit the app and manage it through the iTunes Store and other directories.
Keep in mind that these are just the main roles virtual staff members can fill. You’ll also find that more clerical work, such as basic bookkeeping, is also being outsourced on a regular basis—and has been for more than two decades already. The bottom line is that as long as you can identify the tasks within the role and as long as the work can be done via a computer connected to the Internet, there’s someone out there who can do it.
Now that you understand the importance of defining roles and have seen the different types of VAs that are available, it’s time to search for potential candidates. Before we begin, let me give you a few pieces of advice on the hunting, hiring, and firing (ouch!) processes.
• Hiring a VA is a process. You’re looking for a good fit—not the perfect fit. Don’t settle on anyone, but also understand that the only way to truly know if someone will work out is to give him or her a chance. This whole thing is a learning process that will get easier for you as time goes on.
• Listen to your gut. If someone looks great on paper but there’s a little buzzer going off in your head that’s telling you to pass, don’t hire that person. Simple, right?
• Pay attention to response time. If you’re going back and forth with a potential VA and you’re not happy with his or her response time—or if the candidate continues to miss specific questions in your e-mails—then expect the same type of interaction in your day-to-day workflow. Then ask yourself, “Can I live with this?”
As long as you implement the hiring practices I’m about to show you, you’ll greatly increase your chances of successfully finding the right candidate.
When most people consider starting an online business, it’s usually to escape an unfulfilling job or to earn an extra living on the side—but that wasn’t the case with Todd Beuckens. As a teacher based in Asia, Todd’s passion for education inspired him to create Elllo.org, an e-learning site designed to give students and teachers the resources they need to become better educated at no charge. With more than ten years of teaching experience, Todd thoroughly understood the needs of both students and teachers. This allowed him to create the kind of content he felt was scarce online—or anywhere, for that matter.
To monetize (meaning make money directly from his website), Todd used Google AdSense and sold digital products and a few online classes. For five long years, Todd was strapped for cash. Every piece of his business, from coding his website to creating custom graphics, was his responsibility. It wasn’t until he came upon a coding problem he couldn’t solve that he decided to seek outside help. When he did so, Todd realized that it’s infinitely more efficient to hire an extra hand than to try to teach yourself specialized skills.
After this epiphany, Todd made himself an interesting promise. Despite his passion for his teaching job, he resolved to quit the moment he had made enough income to replace his salary and to live the coveted lifestyle of a digital entrepreneur, traveling extensively and visiting exotic beaches.
But surprisingly, after eight months of soaking up the sun and living what he thought was “the dream,” Todd was miserable. He realized just how much he missed teaching and his community of colleagues. Todd realized he wanted to return to teaching, but he wasn’t willing to close up shop on his website or to go back to driving himself into the ground by teaching full-time while running his online business as a one-man show. He needed to find a healthy balance.
Why Virtual Staffing?
By returning to a teaching position, Todd could leverage his salary to outsource work for his online business while continuing to do the work he loved. Shortly after making this decision, Todd transitioned into professional outsourcing and now only does about 20 percent of the work he did previously in his Internet business while also working as a full-time teacher.
Todd often recalls a particular story to reiterate the power and efficiency of a workforce made up of VAs. Years ago, Todd worked in publishing and was asked to produce a series of books. He was paid $10,000 to create just one of the titles. The book contained fourteen educational lessons and was compiled by a team consisting of a co-author, designer, editor, and sales staff. From concept to distribution, the book took two years to complete and is still available for purchase today.
Compare that to a website that Todd recently created to help people learn Spanish. It’s a free platform that consists of more than 300 videos of Spanish speakers from twelve different countries and various quizzes to help challenge the learner. However, the site’s most impressive feature is that it was created using VAs who do not speak Spanish. The site took less than three months to complete and will be distributed in print and mobile versions as well.
Thanks to Todd’s VAs, the site was created in a language he does not speak, for a fraction of the cost it would have otherwise taken to complete just the website alone, without the print or mobile iterations.
Todd’s Hurdles
The biggest hurdle Todd faced was a mental block concerning the risks of owning a small business. Questions like, “Why would someone want to work for a small-time operation?” and “What if I get ripped off?” were constantly in the back of his mind.
These two questions were quickly answered once Todd took the plunge. He learned that most independent contractors and VAs prefer working for smaller businesses because they receive better treatment. Todd realized that having virtual staff was not only personally liberating, but also that most VAs are hardworking people who enjoy being a part of something that’s constantly growing and improving.
Todd’s Best Practices
• Work with multiple VAs instead of hiring one full-time VA. Instead of hiring one full-time VA to complete a project, Todd prefers working with multiple VAs who each handle a small set of tasks for a couple hours a week until a project is completed. He’s also found that some VAs would rather collaborate with multiple employers for a few hours each week than hitch their carts to just one person or project. For example, let’s say Todd needs 500 quizzes created for one of his teaching sites. Instead of putting all of his eggs in one basket with a single assistant, he’ll hire a group of VAs so he can determine who is best suited for the job, then assign the quizzes to an equal number of VAs after dismissing those that don’t quite fit the bill and boosting the hours (and workload, obviously) of those who are hitting the mark. This allows him to keep moving forward without having to begin the hiring process all over again and rewards those virtual workers who show a better fit with his plans.
• Look for freelancers or VAs with no reviews. Everyone needs a chance to get started, and this strategy can result in a win-win situation if executed correctly. Todd will contact these newbies, give them the rundown of his business, and offer them positions as VAs. Some of his best hires are still with him today and were found using this exact strategy.
• Be a nice guy. It’s a simple strategy that works well. The difference between productive virtual workers who produce amazing work over a long period of time and those who dwindle away into the virtual wilderness lies in how you treat them.
Todd’s Tools of the Trade
Here are the top tools Todd uses when working with his virtual staff:
• Screencast (Screencast.com): Step-by-step instruction on creating training content exactly the way you want it to be consumed by your VA.
• Dropbox (Dropbox.com): A document-sharing program that keeps everyone on the same page. Individual folders can be shared with different team members.
• Skype (Skype.com): The best means of communicating face-to-face with your global staff.
Todd’s ability to communicate clearly with his VAs, to understand what they are all about, and to see how they like to work with their bosses has allowed him to maximize the output of his virtual workers. Knowing whether each worker wants to be part-time or full-time as well as what start and end times everyone prefers to work are also keys to his ongoing success.
Finding the Right Virtual Staff
There are a wide range of platforms and options to connect you with VAs for your business, each with its pros and cons. Ultimately, you’ll have to choose the direction to go in, but here’s my honest opinion on each option.
1. Outsourcing Companies
Staffing companies allow you to rent employees from them to perform the various tasks you need completed. I can’t think of a good reason why anyone would want to take this route. Allow me to explain why.
Things to Consider
• These services are expensive because the outsourcing companies profit by marking up the cost of each VA’s work.
• The VAs are not part of your team—they’re paid by the outsourcing company and not by you.
• There’s little opportunity to create loyalty and trust because the worker is employed by the outsourcing company and not directly by you.
• If the outsourcing company goes out of business, all of your help will be lost overnight.
2. Job-Posting Sites
Elance.com, oDesk.com, and Craigslist.org all fall into this category. Job-posting sites are the best way to find virtual workers to whom you can outsource your project-based tasks. The way that you use these sites is quite simple:
1. Post a task or project that needs to be completed.
2. Set a price you’re willing to pay.
3. Get offers from freelancers.
4. Award a freelancer the job.
5. Set project milestones and begin!
Things to Consider
• You’ll be able to quickly find people to complete individual projects.
• You can see past reviews to get an idea of the worker’s performance.
• You are one of many clients each person is working with, and the workers understand that you may only work with them on just one project (although you do have the ability to work with them again if you like them). This can make it difficult to establish a good working relationship with a set routine.
• Rather than trying to make one full-time employer or two or three part-time employers happy, these types of VAs get paid more when they turn out higher volumes of work. As a result, the quality of the work may suffer.
3. Freelancer Marketplace Sites
The recent economic downturn combined with the popularity of job-posting sites has inspired many people to venture out on their own and create “VA for hire” services. These people are skilled freelancers with specific skills who classify themselves as entrepreneurs rather than VAs—and they are particularly popular in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Check out sites like Freelancer.com, Guru.com, and Fiverr.com to find an abundance of such freelancers.
Typically, you can expect to pay more for individual tasks or blocks of time via these types of sites in comparison with job-posting sites.
Things to Consider
• If you’re a first-time outsourcer, get started by trying things out by simply assigning a quick and simple-to-complete task. These types of freelancers are accustomed to selling their own services and will take the time to walk you through what they do.
• These freelancers will want to establish ongoing relationships with you.
• These freelancers are highly skilled, and they are also entrepreneurs, which means they charge premium prices for their services.
• Since you’re working with one person and someone with an entrepreneurial mindset, you may find that he or she is more opinionated and less flexible than someone found on a job-posting website, for example.
4. VA Recruiting Services
A firm providing you with a pool of potential VAs is a relatively new concept that has only been around for the last few years. In the interest of full disclosure, I should note that I own such a company, VirtualStaffFinder.com (focusing on the GVA role discussed above). To find a VA using this method, you sign up for the recruiting service, submit a job description, and then sit back and relax. You can focus on running your company while the recruiting team does the interviewing, background checks, testing, and additional screening needed to create a finalized list of candidates. Then you’ll interview the candidates, typically via Skype, and hire the one whom you are confident you can get to work with right away.
Things to Consider
• VA recruiting services are a simple and efficient way to find a VA because you don’t have to do any of the legwork.
• You’ll benefit from the experience of job-placement professionals who handle these types of recruiting situations daily.
• The VA becomes your direct employee and therefore a part of your team—trained and managed directly by you, unlike some freelance workers you will find on job-posting sites, who will probably want to continue to work with other clients.
• Recruiting services have an excellent hit-to-miss ratio. They are an effective way to find the right people for the roles you’re looking to fill and avoid hiring the wrong people.
While the above methods are the heavy hitters, they aren’t the only means out there for finding good quality VAs—if you’re willing to do a little extra work, you could also try using social media to find your VA. After a poor first experience with outsourcing, janitor-turned-entrepreneur David Risley turned to Twitter to find his next VA, and he loves the simplicity of the microblogging site.
In closing this subject, I suggest that whenever possible, you chat—and ideally video chat—with the person you’re hiring via a service like Skype or Google Hangouts. This will give you the opportunity to see, or at least hear, your potential VA and understand his or her personality a little more. This might not be needed all the time; I doubt I’d be concerned with personality if someone were just designing a logo for me, for example. But in some cases this “face-to-face” conversation might turn out to be the difference between hiring and not hiring someone for the job.
The 10 Elements of a Good Job Description
I can’t stress this enough: Hiring the right people begins with defining the roles your business needs.
Once the roles are defined, the next step is to create a solid job description that will help you attract the right candidates if you’re using a job-posting site and will serve as a guide through the interview process if you use a recruiting service. Putting in the time and effort to create a really strong job description will enable you to find the right people to work in your business.
Here are the ten elements a good job description should have:
1. Job Title
The title should clearly reflect the role. Avoid gimmicky or misleading titles.
Here are a few examples of particularly good job titles I’ve seen recently:
• Part-Time Data Entry VA Needed for Growing Tour Company
• Graphic Designer Needed for Children’s Kindle Project
• Web Developer Needed for E-mail Newsletter Template Design
• Virtual Assistant Needed to Support CEO on Daily To-Do List Items
2. Type of Position
Note whether the job is project based, part time, or full time.
3. Working Time Zone
In which time zone are you working and in which time zone do you require your VA(s) to be working? This allows candidates to see at a quick glance what your working structure will be like together.
4. Skills
What particular skills will this role require? Be extremely specific here.
5. Daily Reporting and Accountability
In order to avoid confusion or miscommunication, you should have your team members give a quick report at the end of each day summarizing what they worked on and any progress or problems. This can be done through a simple e-mail or by updating a shared document via a file-sharing service like Google Drive or Dropbox. It’s a good idea to note your expectations of daily reporting in a job description.
6. Proposed Compensation
This is what are you willing to pay. You can specify a maximum number of hours per month for part-time workers or maximum monthly pay for full-time VAs. Be sure to offer what you feel the VA is genuinely worth.
7. Daily Work Description
Write a concise description of the duties and responsibilities for this particular role. The more detailed it is, the better.
This might include
• key skills required on a day-to-day basis
• daily tasks to be performed
• experience required in using certain tools, software, and systems
• hardware requirements, such as a webcam or scanner
8. Weekly Work Description
If applicable, list the revolving weekly tasks the person in this role should expect to perform for you.
9. Quarterly Tasks
List work that will not need to be done daily or weekly but will need to be completed on a quarterly basis, such as updating spreadsheets, attending brainstorming sessions, and making suggestions on how to improve your systems and processes.
10. Potentially Harder Tasks and Skills
This is an opportunity to highlight the more difficult skills you’re looking for. It’s important to ask your VA how he or she is continuing to enhance these skills. Be careful here, though—you don’t want to scare the VA away!
No matter where you found them, once you’ve solidified your job description and the applicants have started to present themselves, the next step is to chat with the people who look the most exciting on paper.
This is a job description that we received recently from a Virtual Staff Finder client. You’ll see how simply it’s laid out while still being quite detailed. This is how organized you need to be if you want to do this thing right from the outset.
| Job Title | General VA |
| Position Type | Full-Time |
| Time Zone | Happy to have them work their normal workday hours. |
| Daily Reporting | Just a simple bullet-point e-mail at the end of each day is fine. |
| Proposed Compensation | Starting at $550 per month with a review at 12 months. |
| Elaborate on Tasks and Skills | Generaleye for detailexcellent English reading and writingability to clearly follow instructionshigh level of organization and ability to prioritizeself-management and initiativeDaily TasksClean up new database entries from the last 24 hours.Check e-mails and reply to all e-mails that you can do.Check Facebook personal messages.Accept new Facebook friends and categorize by list.Send a personal e-mail to everyone who joins client database, so we can tag.Send e-mails to new members for photos and to add them to the Facebook group.Schedule social media updates in HootSuite.Weekly TasksCall everyone who has stopped receiving e-mails to get new e-mail addresses.Ensure that your computer is backed up and all files are in more than one place.Add new posts on our blogs.Load new member photos in template and upload files to Dropbox.Comment on other related YouTube channels.Quarterly TasksTranscribe any new YouTube videos and upload transcription.Create spreadsheets of contact data from websites.Ongoing/Revolving TasksClean up old database: filter spam, unsubscribes, etc.Create playlists for all current YouTube videos.Follow up on undeliverable mail: call people to get correct addresses and update in database.Online research: sourcing gifts, restaurants, etc. |
| Job Title | General VA |
| Position Type | Full-Time |
| Time Zone | Happy to have them work their normal workday hours. |
| Daily Reporting | Just a simple bullet-point e-mail at the end of each day is fine. |
| Proposed Compensation | Starting at $550 per month with a review at 12 months. |
| Elaborate on Tasks and Skills | Generaleye for detailexcellent English reading and writingability to clearly follow instructionshigh level of organization and ability to prioritizeself-management and initiativeDaily TasksClean up new database entries from the last 24 hours.Check e-mails and reply to all e-mails that you can do. |
| Elaborate on Tasks and Skills | Check Facebook personal messages.Accept new Facebook friends and categorize by list.Send a personal e-mail to everyone who joins client database, so we can tag.Send e-mails to new members for photos and to add them to the Facebook group.Schedule social media updates in HootSuite.Weekly TasksCall everyone who has stopped receiving e-mails to get new e-mail addresses.Ensure that your computer is backed up and all files are in more than one place.Add new posts on our blogs.Load new member photos in template and upload files to Dropbox.Comment on other related YouTube channels. |
| Elaborate on Tasks and Skills | Quarterly TasksTranscribe any new YouTube videos and upload transcription.Create spreadsheets of contact data from websites.Ongoing/Revolving TasksClean up old database: filter spam, unsubscribes, etc.Create playlists for all current YouTube videos.Follow up on undeliverable mail: call people to get correct addresses and update in database.Online research: sourcing gifts, restaurants, etc. |
Visit VirtualFreedomBook.com/Reader to download a job description template as well as a fully completed GVA job description for ideas and inspiration.
Tom Libelt, Online Service Provider
Although originally from Poland, Tom Libelt spent most of his childhood in Polish communities in Chicago and New York. An early entrepreneur, Tom co-owned a clothing/record store when he was just sixteen years old. Though it didn’t bring in the big bucks, it did whet his appetite for business.
His journey into digital entrepreneurship began when he started creating AdSense sites. It only took him a couple of weeks to figure out the basics of web design before he was up and running. That’s when the real work began.
Tom quickly found himself swamped with the tasks involved in keeping such an operation afloat. Between keyword research, backlinking, and writing 500-word articles on random topics like train models and Christmas lights, Tom’s days quickly turned into a nonstop grind. His schedule was seriously threatening his sanity and causing him to resent his work. Unable to keep working at such a demanding pace, he realized LibeltySEO.com needed help.
Why Virtual Staffing?
While researching solutions for his productivity problem, Tom remembered a business forum that related the details of outsourcing and VA use. One participant in particular kept raving about his staff in the Philippines-how great they were to work with and how they were running his empire while he had all the time in the world. This piqued Tom’s interest. He realized that if he could reclaim even a fraction of his time, it would make a huge impact in the way his business functioned.
Tom’s Hurdles
When starting out, Tom had no idea what type of average salary a VA should receive. Though he remembers seriously low-balling offers to his potential VAs, he surprisingly still attracted some interest.
His first few hires produced questionable work at best, but Tom was so tired and burnt out from doing everything himself that he was just happy to have someone—anyone—showing interest in collaborating with him. He figured he could always go back and edit their work.
Tom hired three people during the first three months of his new venture and quickly realized that outsourcing can actually create more work if a business owner isn’t careful. In addition to his managerial position, Tom now had to edit and post all of the work his VAs did. And that’s when the next obstacle surfaced—turnover.
As soon as a VA began working with Tom and producing content, it only took a couple weeks before he or she began missing deadlines or going completely AWOL. Not only was this pattern frustrating, but also the effort it took to replace the VAs was incredibly time consuming.
The initial plan looked something like this:
