So, it sounds like you are thinking about starting your own profitable VA business. I don’t blame you, it’s a heck of a way to make a living. I’m in my 5th year as a part-time VA’er and I’ve recently retired from my Corporate job to be a full-time Pinterest Manager. I love the freedom and flexibility of it all. And the fact that most experienced VA’s earn from $30 to $50 an hour doesn’t hurt a bit!
Possibilities for Clients for Your New Business
The beauty of this career path is that the opportunities are somewhat endless. There are so many different types of services you can offer and so many different types of clients you can work for. I typically work for varying types of bloggers, but I know a lot of people specialize in real estate professionals, small business owners, or various sales professionals.
This post may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something, I will receive a small commission at no cost to you. It’s one of the ways I support my site.
Services you Can Offer
As for specialties, you can do general admin work, write content, do social media work, help with bookkeeping tasks, manage Email, do web design or create graphics, and about a zillion other things. I started out doing Pinterest work almost exclusively, but now I’m starting to branch out into WordPress tech support and I’m eyeballing Email management (see my HIRE ME Page). I’m even doing a bit of coaching on the side for other bloggers and VA’s. That’s one of the best things about owning a business like this, you determine your hours, the services you want to cover, and set your own pricing.
How to Get Started with your Profitable VA Business
So, how to get started with your own profitable VA business? Well, there’s a lot of things you need to know. You’ll want to learn how to:
- Determine what services (or combination of services) to offer
- How to set up your packages to let potential clients know what services you have available and your experience level
- Where to find clients and how to set up your business to serve them
- How to come up with a contract to deal with confidentiality issues, payments, and manage expectations – no one ever said that a business like this wasn’t quite challenging at times, especially from a legal standpoint. I have a lawyer that I’m associated with who offers a legal package especially for VA business owners.
- The usual financial aspects of running a business – tracking payments and expenses, figuring out your deductions and other tax issues. I do have some help for you in this area – Quick and Dirty Quickbooks and Panic-Free Tax Prep. I also just finished a post about how to Get Paid on Time as a Freelancer.
- You may also want to set up a website for your new business. I can help with that (see my HIRE ME page) or you could try my friend Shannon’s 5-day website challenge. It’s FREE and super helpful to set up a WordPress website from scratch
Courses/Groups/Training to Get You Started with your Profitable VA Business
Happily, there is a LOT of training available.
I think the best course I can recommend Gina Horkey’s Horkey Handbook training – she has a course on 30 days to owning your own profitable VA business. Her focus is mostly on how to set up and organize your new business. She’s now added a 90 day payment plan which makes it much easier to afford.
If you are specifically focused on Pinterest Management, she has a program specifically for being a Pinterest-Specific VA, then she has a specific Pinterest VA program. That’s exactly what I recommend as it’s been extremely successful for me. It actually enabled me to retire from my Corporate job about 7 years earlier than I would’ve been able to do.
OR – if you are looking to gather up some skills before you are ready to start your business, Rhonda Melogy of Systems by Design is my best pick for general VA training of all sorts. I’m a founding member of her paid mastermind Systems by Design Community on Facebook and it includes a whole bunch of training modules on just about everything you need – Pinterest Management, Instagram Training, Trello, Dubsado, Podcast Management, and they add new ones every month.
It is served smorgasbord style, so you can consume the training in any order you wish and as many courses as you want to take. It’s also a super friendly and helpful group. I pop in there with my business questions several times each week and I always find helpful answers to get me pointed in the right direction.
Learn more about the Systems by Design Program to see if it’s a good fit for you. It was a real game-changer for me. It gave me a lot of ideas on how to find new clients, how to set up my business, how to deal with challenging clients and so much more. It also gave me the confidence to understand the value of what I was offering and raise my prices. Rhonda is VERY active in the group and has live sessions with us several times each week, frequently with expert guest speakers to show us different skills and strategies.
Here are some other posts you may enjoy:
How I was able to Retire 7 Years Early
Freelancers – How to Get Paid on Time
Why I Recommend SiteGround Hosting
Blogging resources I love and recommend:
SiteGround – I have four sites hosted through SiteGround and I’ve used them for years. They’re cheap and their customer service is AMAZING – very fast, very helpful. Learn more about SiteGround HERE.
Tailwind – I’ve been working with Tailwind for about five years. They are the pin scheduler of choice and it is jam-packed with great features. If you haven’t already, sign up for a FREE month of Tailwind HERE.
The Isabelle theme by Bluchic – is my favorite theme for WordPress websites. I’ve used it to build a bunch of different websites. It’s pretty, easy to customize, and really simple to use. It’s shown in a very pale pink, but I’ve done it in turquoise, emerald green, and navy/gold color schemes. For safety and security reasons, I will not ever use a free WordPress theme. This is the engine that powers and protects your website. Learn about the Isabelle theme HERE.
Legal Templates – You are required by law to have a certain package of legalese on your blog. You need to have copyright notices, privacy policies, and various other terms and conditions to protect yourself from being sued. The package I recommend is created by Amira Law – a lawyer who specializes in all aspects of blogging and internet business legalities. Learn more about these Legal Templates HERE.
Pinterest Resources – Pinterest is definitely my jam. I have an Ebook that is very affordable and is packed with helpful tips. OR, if you want a more personalized touch, I will do a Pinterest/Tailwind audit where I go over your account with a 30-point checklist and then set up a Zoom call with you to give you TONS of suggestions. Order the Ebook HERE and the Pinterest Audit HERE.
HIRE ME – I make a full-time living taking great care of my blogger peeps. I’ve done Pinterest Management for the last five years for dozens of clients. I set up mailing lists, automations and build pop-ups for people. I can also build you a new website pretty much for FREE. To learn more – go HERE.
This is great advice! I already do just social media management but I have considered adding some other services like bookkeeping and email management as well!
I recently started an online business for tarot reading, though it’s not quite profitable yet. I’ll consider joining your webinar!
Thanks so much. I would think these techniques would work just fine for a tarot reading business. That’s definitely thinking outside the box!
I run a virtual assistant/website business on my blog… however, I’m always up to refine and improve what I offer – and how I offer it. I’ll be sure to check into those resources. Thanks Adrian!
Yep, a VA business is where it’s at. I’m looking to go full-time this summer. Definitely check out the free webinar at least. I found it very helpful.
Since you have experience with both Abbey Ashley & Gina Horkey, whose paid course would you recommend? Gina or Abbey?
Great question! I think it depends on what you are looking for. I think Abbey has a great community, very supportive and lots of helpful folks. But her courses are very tool based – learn Trello, learn Dubsado, learn Tailwind, etc. While Gina’s courses seem very JOB focused – become a real estate VA, become a Project Manager VA, etc. I’m seriously looking at her Email course, which is on sale for 15% off this week. That’s something I’d like to try. Either one you pick, I hope you’ll be kind enough to use one of my affiliate links. Because – money! But seriously, I think they’re both good, but have a very different focus. Hope that helps.