Earlier this year, I had several coaching clients who were reaching a stage in their business where they clearly needed to hire their first virtual assistant. My clients were getting caught up working on administrative tasks instead of focusing on growing the business and it was starting to show.
These clients knew they needed to hire help in the form of a virtual assistant, but they were afraid to because of how much it costs. Truthfully, if you’ve never hired a contractor you have to pay each month, then it can be nerve wrecking to take the leap and spend the money on hiring team members. However, if you want to continue growing your business without spinning your wheels, you eventually have to bite the bullet and figure it out.
Here are some ways on how to pay for your first virtual assistant without having to worry about going bankrupt.
Use Your Newfound Time Wisely
The great thing about hiring a virtual assistant is that it literally buys you time. A virtual assistant gets a lot of stuff off your plate so you can use your newfound time to focus on more important tasks.They key here is to figure out what those tasks actually are.
The smart business owner knows to use their newfound time growing the actual business. This may mean taking on new clients. It may look like creating a new offering. It could even look like doing more sales.
The point is to use your newfound time on activites that actually generate revenue. In doing so you’ll have more than enough money to pay for your first virtual assistant.
Negotiate
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from running a business it’s that everything is negotiable. Don’t be afraid to interview multiple virtual assistants and negotiate the price based on what you actually need them to do.
For example, you may find that hiring a virtual assistant who charges based on how many hours they’ve worked isn’t cost effective. Instead, you may opt for a virtual assistant that offers packages for specific tasks, such as email management and scheduling.
This depends entirely on you and what you actually need. In order to get clear about this, I usually advise clients to do a time audit for at least two weeks. I instruct them to write down all the activities they did in their business every hour. As they go along, I also encourage them to clearly mark the activities that could be handled by a virtual assistant. This way they know what they actually need and can negotiate.
Start Small
You really may not be able to afford to outsource everything to your first virtual assistant, and that’s entirely okay. If this is the case, just start small. Perhaps you simply start by hiring someone to only manage your email. This would be more affordable than hiring a virtual assistant to handle all administrative tasks.
See What You Can Automate With Systems
Another way to make hiring your virtual assistant more affordable is to take a look at what tasks you can automate before you hire anybody. For example, you can automate social media sharing with a tool like Edgar, which repeatedly shares content you’ve uploaded to your library on all of your social media accounts.
Edgar is $50 a month. It may seem pricey but compare that to hiring a virtual assistant to handle your social media for you in addition to handling your email – it would certainly cost a lot more than $50 a month! By automating social media, that’s one less task you need from your virtual assistant which then makes it easier to negotiate with them.
Final Thoughts
Beginning to hire team members helps you make more money. Period. It may not seem like it at first, but if you use your time wisely and are smart about costs, you can easily pay for your first virtual assistant.
