Ready To Scale Your Virtual Assistant Business? Here Are 9 Ways To Change Things Up

It might be time to scale your Virtual Assistant business if you’ve grown bored with the same routine day in and day out. Or maybe you just want to work less and earn more. Whatever it is, I hope this post will help you to choose what works best for you.

I know this was me after being a Virtual Assistant for 5 years. I had grown restless and wanted a change. I enjoyed working with clients but somewhere along the way I stopped liking what I was doing. It was time for me to move to the next level.

How To Know When It’s Time To Scale Your Virtual Assistant Business?

Maybe you’re looking to:

• Have more time and freedom?
• Earn more money?
• Become a consultant or specialist?
• Stop working 1:1 with clients?
• Reach more people?
• Change things up?
• Or… whatever else it might be!

The beauty of having your own business is you can change anything at any time! My motto is Your Business – Your Choice. You get to choose everything you do – so when it’s time for a change – change it! You don’t have to keep doing what you’re doing now – especially if you no longer enjoy it. So if you’re ready for a change read on!

The Most Common Options To Scale Your Virtual Assistant Business

#1 – Build A Team Of Virtual Assistants

Build yourself a team of Virtual Assistants that can either do overflow work for your clients or the work you don’t want to. Just know that when you add more people to your business – it adds a layer of complexity to it. More moving pieces to manage.

This is where I started. I wanted to get more time back in my day but not take a hit on my income. Plus I was tired of turning business away for things my clients wanted but I didn’t do. It’s a great way to scale your business. Just be sure you’re clear on everything involved.

#2 – Start A Virtual Assistant Agency

First off, there’s a big difference between a VA Team and a VA Agency. When you build a team for your business you’re still working with clients. You can get all the details in my post, Build A Virtual Assistant Team Or Agency To Increase Your Income + Get Your Time Back.

When you start an agency you take on the role of CEO, which usually means you’re no longer working with clients. You’re in charge of going out and getting the clients for the business. You become the sales and marketing department all by yourself.

I would recommend building a team first then moving into an agency so you have some experience and a general idea of what it’s like to manage a team and delegate the work. Building an agency is a great way to scale your Virtual Assistant business if your goal is to earn lots of money without working one on one with clients.

#3 – Become A VA Matchmaker

A Matchmaker is someone who refers or matches Virtual Assistants with clients. You become a connector. There are a couple of different ways matchmaking works. Either way is a great way to help both clients and Virtual Assistants.

One is to help clients find qualified and vetted Virtual Assistants.  Your main focus here is creating a satisfied client base where you charge them a fee to match them with the right VA.

The second option is helping qualified and vetted Virtual Assistants to find clients. Your main focus here is creating a satisfied base of Virtual Assistants where you charge them a monthly fee to be part of your association or club. This is what most of the VA associations do.

If you want to know more about this possibility you can read my deep-dive post Become A Virtual Assistant Matchmaker If You’re Passionate About Connecting People.

#4 – Affiliate Marketing For Virtual Assistants

This is another great way to scale your Virtual Assistant business by making some extra income and it’s becoming more and more popular. Especially with techie tools.

Affiliate Marketing is where you refer products and services to your audience and get paid a commission or referral fee aka passive income. You get what’s called an affiliate link that tracks the sales you refer and you get paid!

Most people create a resources page on their website and add their affiliate links to it. If you want to know more about this don’t miss reading the full blog post on Affiliate Marketing 101 For Virtual Assistants: Earn Passive Income Without Creating Anything.

#5 – Become A Specialist Or Consultant

When you’re a specialist you are known for specific expertise. You do more strategic type work vs the day-to-day stuff. Specialists or consultants can earn up to 3x more money than assistants. The best way to become an expert is by learning everything you can about a specific industry, techie tool, or system.

• What are you passionate about?
• Where do you have existing expertise?
• Is there something you want to learn?

Remember to check out the second blog post in this series about in-demand Virtual Assistant services: Why Becoming A Virtual Assistant Specialist Will Make You The Go-To Pro + Increase Your Income.

If you want to be a Virtual Assistant Specialist or Consultant, take some time to figure out what are you passionate about and how you can offer it as a service to your clients. A good place to start is my TechieU Training.

#6 – Create Digital Products

If you’re looking for a way to earn more money and work less you can create and sell digital Virtual Assistant products. There are so many different things you can create based on your experience and expertise.

Products can be simple or complex, pricey or affordable. You could create something as simple as an ebook. Or you could create an entire course or membership program.

If you’re looking to move away from working 1:1 with clients and want to reach a larger audience, products might be the way to go! You can read more in my blog post Sell Simple Virtual Assistant Products + Earn Money While You Sleep Or Play.

#7 – Become An Online Project Manager

I’m a Project Manager. It’s something I brought with me from my cube farm days and it’s something I am passionate about. In a nutshell, an OBPM manages online projects for their clients’ businesses. 

They focus on helping their clients launch new products and programs or implement new technology and systems. They work based on projects and earn more than a VA and OBM.

If you want to know more please read The Ultimate VA Success Guide: The Ins + Outs Of Virtual Assistant Project Management or check out my FREE training. It’s on-demand, automated, and starts every 5 minutes. So you can watch it at your convenience.

#8 – Build A Network Of Referral Partners

Referral partners are when you transfer clients to a business partner or colleague for either a flat fee or percentage. You are turning the client over to someone else so they help them with services you don’t offer or if you’re fully booked.

I’ve written more about this strategy to add an additional revenue stream of passive income to your business in Why Virtual Assistant Referral Partners Are A Source Of Income + Make Your Clients Happy. It’s a straightforward and easy way to scale your Virtual Assistant business. Give it a try!

#9 – Coaching And Training

This one is also a good choice to scale your Virtual Assistant business, however, I hesitated to add it based on what I’ve noticed happening in the industry these past few years.

I believe that you need to have more than a year or two of experience before moving into coaching or training. Because it’s important to know what you’re doing before you start teaching or coaching others – period. Unfortunately, many new Virtual Assistants jump over to coaching and training before they’ve even completed their first year in business.

In my opinion, you should have at least 5 years experience. Why? Because you need to know what you’re teaching actually works. That you’ve used your “system” successfully in your own business. You can’t simply take some training and then decided to turn around and teach it to others.

You need to have experienced the highs and the lows of running a VA business and know how to work through them. You need to have actually been successful at marketing, getting clients, and making money running a full-time VA business. My question is – what are they teaching and is it ethical – does it really work?

Experience and success are key if you’re going to coach or mentor others. Look at these statistics for small businesses and what does it tell you?

1. 20% of small businesses fail in their first year
2. 30% of small businesses fail in their second year
3. 50% of small businesses fail after five years in business
4. 70% of small business owners fail in their 10th year in business

There is so much potential in this industry. It’s there for the taking. It’s up to you to figure out what works best for you and your goals. As I mentioned, these are not the only ways you can scale your Virtual Assistant business. These are the most common. The sky is the limit!

So… do any of these peaks your interest?  Feel free to post below and let me know.

Thanks for reading – Susan