How to Use VAs to Scale Your Digital Marketing

Do you want to utilize virtual assistants to scale your digital marketing? We do, and we want you to do it too!

Utilizing VAs is one of the most common pain points from our clients and partners over the last 20 years. Luckily, we created this post to help you dip your toes into the world of VAs. If you want to take things to the next level, and get step-by-step instructions on how to hire, train, and manage VAs, we have the VA Hiring Course to answer all of these questions.

How much does a VA cost?

It depends on how good they are but generally, VAs typically begin at around $500 a month full-time, which works out to $3 an hour. 

Remember that your time and mind are worth more than $3 an hour.  

Others might suggest only hiring from the US, but then you’re going to be looking at $80 to 100$ an hour. The work may be of higher quality, but you must ask yourself if the cost is worth it.

Once you hire the VAs, you have to train them as well. We also have a course for the VAs to get training.

Six Roles for VAs

There are many roles for which you can hire a VA, and the pricing can be anywhere from $3 an hour to $20 an hour, depending on how good they are:

1. Operations VA
2. Video Editor VA
3. Graphics Designer VA
4. Web Developer VA
5. Content Writer VA
6. Community Manager VA
7. Process Development VA

We have a six-phase process that we hire for. They go through six roles and phases, and I want you to understand them.

Have a clear process

Remember, when hiring a VA, you must hire them into existing processes (SOPs). 

You should have a job post that is tied to training. You can never hire somebody without a process. 

Let’s say you hire a VA who is good at editing videos but you don’t have a process. Then how will you coordinate with them to store files? How will they get access? How will they know who else is on the team to work?

And if that process isn’t defined, it will burden you. Then VAs will come to you, wasting your time and asking you multiple questions.

We have a whole process for that. The VAs go through our level-one training when we hire.

First I want them to study the training. They will have to pay attention to the training because there will be a quiz at the end. So when they are learning the training, they have to pass. They need to get at least 80% on the quiz.

Have different levels

Our people go through different levels when we hire them. They start at three dollars an hour, then continuously receive raises as they progress through the different levels and learn how to complete new tasks.

We have everything mapped out at these different levels on how you qualify so it’s not subjective.

They might say, “I made $10 an hour with my previous job,” but we have levels with standards for each level. We don’t mind paying good VAs what they are worth, and their worth to the company is defined by their progression through our training.

When you get a team of more than three VAs, you need a manager 

Otherwise, you will end up managing all these people, defeating the purpose of having VAs. Your manager can drive the best results if there are clearly documented SOPs for them to follow.

Don’t outsource hiring to another agency

I’ve worked with many agencies that hire VAs on behalf of other people. The failure rate on those is 80% to 90%. My good friend John Jonas, founder of Onlinejobs.ph would agree.

My buddy Beja Parmar is probably one of the best people in the world in hiring, managing, and training VAs. He has 800 VAs. Anyone with a lot of experience in hiring and managing VAs will tell you the same thing. 

Need help finding your first VA?

Check out our Dollar a Day program to make the process faster and easier with Dennis’s help!