All your questions about becoming a Virtual Assistant – answered

In my free Facebook group for aspiring and new Virtual Assistants I get asked loads of questions so I thought I’d pull out the most common ones and answer them all in one place.

Please note, this isn’t to deter anyone from asking any of these questions in the future. I don’t care if the same question is asked a million times because it helps me understand what I need to cover to help you on your exciting journey.

How do you get clients as a Virtual Assistant?

This is the question that worries every new VA and if you’ve never been self employed or worked in sales / marketing before, you’ll have never had a need to do this and so I know it can seem really daunting, unachievable almost.

Well it’s a good job you’re here as I know lots of ways for you to find those clients.

Put simply, all you need to do is:

Surround yourself with relevant people, relevant business owners and keep telling everyone what you do. That’s marketing.

You can do that by sending emails to small business owners and tell them what you can do for them, join in person or virtual networking groups or Facebook groups where other business owners hang out.

My free Facebook group often has opportunities for associate work and we also welcome business owners in who are looking for VAs too.

But, at time of writing, the very best way to get your own clients is via social media. 

There’s nowhere else you can advertise your services, for free, to such a huge amount of people.

Posting for business is a different kettle of fish to posting pics of you and your friends having a cocktail on holiday, and some people get so worried they won’t do it well, they get completely overwhelmed and freeze.

I get that. I used to think one of my posts would attract the tabloids, they’d unearth the story about when I stole a penny sweet aged 9 and my life would be over. But, strangely, that never happened.

If you want clients you’ve got to step outside that comfort zone. Watch how the big businesses market themselves, watch your peers. It’ll soon get easier.

Should I be an associate VA first?

Lots of new VAs ask whether they should be an associate Virtual Assistant first to ‘get experience’.

Experience of what?

I encourage all new VAs to only ever offer services that you’re confident and competent at already so there’s no need to get experience.

Being an associate is a wonderful way to get extra work but you don’t have the luxury of choosing your own clients, you work for the clients your Lead VA needs support with. You also get paid a lot less being an associate so it’ll take you longer to leave employment if you take on too much associate work.

Being an associate also won’t give you experience of marketing, as the Lead VA finds the clients.

I’m in no way dismissing being an associate. I have associates that work with me and they’re brilliant, I wouldn’t be without them. But don’t think that being an associate gives you anything more than getting yourself out there and getting your own clients.

If you do want to apply for an associate role then please read my blog on How to get associate jobs as a VA as it gives advice from me and other Lead VAs on how you should respond to their requests for applications. It will give you the best chance of being considered.

Do Virtual Assistants need a website?

I get asked this a lot, and I know you want the answer to be “nooo, that’s fine, you don’t have to bother” but unfortunately that’s not the case. 

I wouldn’t let the lack of a website hold you back from starting your business and marketing yourself but it’s important to get one as soon as you can.

Today, if you don’t have a website then most people will go to someone who does. A website gives potential clients confidence that you’re who you say you are. That you’re professional and permanent. 

Potential clients want to feel like you are in this for the long haul and won’t just disappear on them once they’ve paid you. Social media is great for marketing but it’s not permanent, your account could be closed at any time and anyone can set up a social media profile without any real time input or consideration.

Your website tells people who you are, what you can do for them and how much you charge whilst also giving a little glimpse into who they’re buying from.

Would you hand over the money you’re earning to live on to someone who you’ll never meet in person and just has a social media profile?

This is just a brief description of what a good website can do. I’ve written a blog that goes into more detail if you still need convincing. Creating a VA Website

Another good reason to have a website is that you own the website and the data and images on it. You’re just renting space from Meta or TikTok and they don’t follow any good landlord practices –  they’ve been known to evict people with very little reason and sometimes squatters move in and lock you out and they don’t really do anything about it.

If you want to save some money and learn a new skill that you can then charge clients for, I also have a course that’ll show you step by step how to buy your domain and build your own website on WordPress. You can find that here How to Build & Maintain a WordPress Website

Do Virtual Assistants need to offer social media marketing?

You don’t NEED to offer anything. This is your business and you should offer what you enjoy, what you’re confident in delivering and what you can do without guidance or micro management. After all, why start your own business then spend all day doing things you don’t like? You may as well be back at work. 

Clients will only ask for social media marketing support if you promote that you do it. Ignore that you think every VA offers social media marketing – they don’t!

If you have experience in social media marketing and enjoy doing it then go ahead. But it’s absolutely not something you need to offer to get client.

But never feel like you have to offer any service you don’t want to. This journey is all about creating a better working life for you.

Do I need contracts as a Virtual Assistant? 

Yep! That was easy wasn’t it. However, they’re not mandatory.

Contracts not only protect you but also show the client that you’re professional and take theirs, and your own business seriously. The contract protects both of you.

There may be times when a client wants you to sign their contract instead of signing yours. If this is the case you have a read of this Should you sign your client’s contract as a VA?. 

It can be very enticing to try not to bother your new client and start working with them immediately but you need to protect yourself. I can list forever the number of occasions VAs have got themselves into bother and have zero recourse because they didn’t confirm terms with a contract. 

I use and recommend contract from KoffeeKlatch. I’m also incredibly grateful to be one of their affiliates which means they’ve given me a code to get you 10% off the price with discount code – CATH10.

Why do Virtual Assistants need insurance? 

It’s not a legal requirement to have insurance but why risk it? I had a client who had, at the time, been in business eight years (not a VA) and she published a document for someone that included some derogatory comments about someone else. It resulted in a fine of £85,000. I kid you not! She didn’t have insurance. It cost her thousands to argue her case alone because she’d never seen the need for insurance.

You really never know what might happen or how someone might react.

Insurance gives you the peace of mind that you’re covered against anything that may go wrong during the contract and occasionally things do go wrong…

From – posting a slightly sweary rant that you know your friends will think is hilarious, then realising you posted to your clients LinkedIn account (Gahhh!) to deleting an entire database of your clients info. Ooops. These things do actually happen.

Unfortunately mistakes will be made or things will occur beyond your control and this is where your insurance comes in.

At a minimum you should have professional indemnity insurance. 

You might also think about getting cyber insurance, this won’t protect you from the dangers of being online, malware, ransomware, or financial fraud but will help you with the financial cost of getting your business back up and running. 

You may be offered public liability insurance but unless you are having clients onsite or going to their site, then there should be no need for this. But always seek confirmation from a professional.

If you’d like more information about the kind of insurance you might need then head over to this blog for more info. What Insurance do VAs Need

What are the best services to offer as a Virtual Assistant?

Easy. The services you enjoy and are confident and competent at providing. 

Email and diary management are always in demand but if you don’t like doing this then there are so many other services you could offer.

Think about what you’re good at doing, then about what you enjoy doing. This is your business, it should be fun.

If you need some help with deciding what to offer then you can download my free guide – ’90+ Services you can offer as a Virtual Assistant’.

What social media platforms should Virtual Assistants use?

You should be on the platforms where your ideal clients hang out.

LinkedIn is a great platform for business to business (B2B) marketing because it’s so easy to build a relevant audience at a massively quicker rate than somewhere like Instagram. 

Also, a Facebook business page is a good idea as so many people look on Facebook for confirmation you’re real for some reason. It’s like Facebook is THE place for everything.

Having a Facebook business profile also helps when you start interacting in Facebook groups as it’s a way for people to check you out and find out what you do.

Getting involved in groups and offering valuable help, when asked, is a great way to show you know what you’re talking about and are the perfect person to help. It allows people to get to know, like and trust you and so when they need help you’ll be the first person they think of.

Do I need to have been a PA or worked in admin to be a Virtual Assistant? 

No. You don’t have to have been a PA or worked in admin to be a great Virtual Assistant.

I’ve helped nurses, social workers, dental nurses, teachers, etc.

There’ll be aspects of any job that others will find useful and valuable. Did you organise people or data? Were you a receptionist who can manage large volumes of calls? Maybe you worked in retail and are great at customer service or managing stock and invoicing. You get the idea? 

Everyone has skills they can use to help others and that clients will find valuable. It’s just a case of writing down everything you did well in previous roles and then crossing off everything you hated doing.  

I’ll direct you again to my free guide ’90+ Services you can offer as a Virtual Assistant’ to help you identify your transferable skills as we often don’t realise that what we do day in day out is a skill.

Will people really pay £30+ an hour when the minimum wage is…? 

Yes they will and I have hundreds of VAs in my circle at any one time who can confirm that. 

And if someone can’t afford our rate I’m afraid it’s not our problem. They need to be charging more in their own business.

Most business owners – who are the ones that are the best to work with – appreciate we pay our own taxes, sick pay, holiday pay, etc out of our earnings so don’t even query it. Clients are paying us for the service we deliver. VAs are changing people’s lives. My own VAs have changed mine! We’re priceless.

Do I need to niche to a sector? 

No, you absolutely don’t have to niche to a sector. I’ve never had a sector niche and have done okay up to now and I’ve been doing this since 2015. However, I do suggest you niche down on the services you offer by offering no more than six.

Niching down on your services means only offering a small (ish) number of services rather than everything you can do.

It’ll make marketing your business easier and it’ll help clients easily understand how you can help them.

If you niche down on your services you’ll become known for those services and it’ll make it easier for people to remember you and recommend you.

When you advertise your services you make each post about just one of your services. You can go all in and just advertise one for a month and then advertise a different service the next month or do this weekly. 

Whether to niche or not is something that people find really confusing and often stops VAs getting started in business so I have a YouTube video How do I choose a niche as a Virtual Assistant? which should help you decide which way you are going to go.

Caveat; if you’re from a medical or legal administrative / PA / secretarial background then I do feel that niching to that sector is the right thing to do.

If I’ve missed out a question you’d like the answer to then hop along to my free Facebook group and post it in there. There’s always someone ready to kindly help you out.