Build A Virtual Assistant Team Or Agency To Increase Your Income + Get Your Time Back

Creating your own Virtual Assistant Team is a great way to help you handle your clients’ work overflow and hand off the tasks you don’t enjoy doing! But understand that it adds another layer of complexity to your business!

Reasons To Start Your Own Virtual Assistant Team

• You’re burnt out.
• You want more time without sacrificing your income.
• You don’t want to keep turning away business.

One day I realized that I was burned out. I was working nights and weekends just to keep up. What I really wanted was the freedom and flexibility I had been dreaming of. But I didn’t have any time left over to do anything other than work and sleep.

I wanted to get more time back in my day without taking a hit on my income. Plus, I was tired of turning business away for things my clients wanted that I didn’t do. There’s only so much time you can sell, so you have to look at alternative ways, if you will, to make more money.

One of the ways is to build a VA team, so bringing on people who work with you. When they get paid, you get paid too. So, you end up working less and earning more, and you’re getting more freedom and flexibility. 

Just know that when you add more people to your business – it adds a layer of complexity to it. But… it’s a great way to scale your business. Just be sure you’re clear on everything involved.

The Difference Between Building A VA Team + A VA Agency

First off, there’s a big difference between a Virtual Assistant Team and a Virtual Assistant Agency. When you build a VA team for your business, you’re still working with clients.

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. 

An agency is just a much larger team, with a lot more complexities. I would recommend you build a VA 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 work successfully.

Building an agency is a great way to earn lots of money without working one on one with clients. You become the CEO instead of the worker bee.

How Is A Virtual Assistant Team Different From Referral Partners?

Referral partners are when you transfer business to a trusted partner or colleague for either a flat fee or percentage. You are turning the client over to someone else – you don’t manage the relationship or the work involved. 

With a Virtual Assistant Team, the business stays with you, and you have a team member complete the work for your clients. You manage the relationship and the work involved.

Benefits Of Building A Virtual Assistant Team Or Agency

There are many benefits of having either a Virtual Assistant Team or a VA agency, including:

• More freedom and flexibility.
• Working less and earning more.
• Stop turning away business.
• Adding a new revenue stream.
• Helping more people.
• Being a true CEO.
• Being more strategic.
• Not doing day-to-day tasks.

The most significant benefit was getting paid even when I wasn’t working directly with clients, which meant I had the freedom and flexibility I was dreaming of! What’s most important to you? You need to ask yourself if you’re looking for a way to scale your business.

If you’re new to being a VA this is not something I recommend doing until you’ve run your own VA business successfully for at least a year. Why? Because you need to understand all the systems and moving parts of how to run a VA business before you can successfully build a Virtual Assistant team or an agency.

How To Get Started

Decide if you want to build a Virtual Assistant team or scale your current team-based business into an agency. Then I recommend you get a solid understanding of the systems you’ll need to add to your current business to support your new team or agency. Both of these options add a layer of complexity to your business.

You’re going to need new systems, processes, and workflows. Not only are you supporting your clients yourself, now you’ve got more clients and additional team members to help. You need to make sure all the work is getting done, not just your own, but your team’s work too. You have to make sure that your clients are getting what they need as well. There are many moving pieces. Things like:

• How do I assign work to my team?
• How do they get paid?
• When do they get paid?
• Are they client-facing?
• Do they track their time?
• How do you, onboard new team members?

And many more systems and workflows you need to be successful. Go in with your eyes open; understand that there are many complexities to building either a team or agency.

Would you prefer having a Virtual Assistant Team or Agency? I’d love to know. Please leave a comment if you’d like to share.

If you’re looking for other ways to scale your VA business, please read my post, Ready To Scale Your Virtual Assistant Business? Here Are 9 Ways To Change Things Up.

Thanks for reading – Susan