Low Cost Virtual Assistants – Are They Worth it?

When you are looking to hire a virtual assistant, the most common question haunting your mind is why to pay $40, $45, $50 or more per hour when you got quotes for $15 per hour. As a result of the tough competition from the foreign markets, new VAs are flooding the scene offering lower and lower and lower quotes. This is not unique but, rather, quite common. Prospective clients feel they got a big deal by having to pay only $15 per hour.

But is it really a big bargain? What are you getting when hiring an inexpensive virtual assistant?

Inexperienced

When you a get an hourly quote of below $30 per hour,  you will find a lack of experience. It is absolutely impossible to run the business at $15 per hour. Consequently, at that rate, the VA would need to have a large compliment of clients to begin to earn decent living. So .. they will always be running out to get new clients. This gets old f.a.s.t. .. really fast.

Disenchanted

At the lower rate, the assistant will find that it can be tough to gain new clients, even at their discounted rate, pay for expenses, and make a profitable business. They get frustrated and finally go back to a traditional, permanent full-time job. As they job hunt, client work backs up to the point where the level of concern is negligible, leaving the client unsatisfied.

Prioritizing

The biggest challenge faced by a virtual assistant is to manage different priorities of different clients. Corporate experience, even if assisting multiple bosses in a traditional business, doesn’t prepare an assistant for juggling various clients in different business, walks of life and industries. They worked with multiple people in the same organization .. that’s very different. Setting priorities becomes a very different beast to tackle and it is what makes a higher rate VA stand out from a low-cost one. Cheap-Quality-Speed are a fallacy.

How Valuable Is Your Time

If time = money, then be sure to include the time spent training your virtual assistant. At the beginning of the relationship, you will inevitably have to invest some time in making sure that your assistant is doing your delegated tasks in the manner that you contracted them for. However, if you are continually training, fixing, tweaking your assistant’s work, then they are hardly worth the cheaper rate that you thought was “such a deal!”

At the end of the day, remember the old adage .. “you get what you pay for.”

About Out of the Office Virtual Assistance:

logo1bAt Out of the Office, we offer ideas and ways to increase your productivity, decrease your workload, and work more efficiently. We nurture a successful business relationship, while continuing to grow as your business partner. We are focused on streamlining your administration, social media planning and execution, and offering creative solutions for your business success.

Image credit: Hans | CCO Public Domain