Here are the top things to know before you submit a referral request via The Registry

• The VAs in our Registry are the only ones in the world who have received intense, broad, and deep industry-specific training. Only those we’ve trained, who have passed a rigorous final exam (over a three-day period!) and who agree to run their businesses with high standards and ethics are in our referral service.

• The VAs in the Registry are all business owners building successful businesses. As a result, they have multiple clients, and will not be available to anyone for more than 40 hours/month.  If you need more support than that, you might consider building a team, or that an employee might be a better bet for you.

• The VAs in the Registry work with clients, not for them, in long-term collaborative relationships that their clients tell us are beyond compare! If you can’t imagine seeing your assistant as an equal—a professional and business owner in her own right, just as you are, you probably don’t want a referral to an AssistU-trained VA. While other contractors will tolerate being treated as employees while being paid as contractors, our VAs will not. And honestly? You don’t want them to. You want someone who runs her own profitable business because it means she’s likely to actually be in business (and available to work with you) for some time to come. You want someone who knows a thing or two about a thing or two and won’t hesitate to step up and share it all with you. You want to work with someone worthy of your time and energy investment. And that will rarely be someone you found in Asia, on Craigslist, or on a freelance gig site. But you can find that person here. If you are using any sort of traditional hiring model, want them to fill out job applications, or jump through hoops to get your attention, their not the right VAs for you.

• The VAs in the Registry provide administrative, operations, and sometimes personal support across the board for their clients. They do not do piecework, project work, or only assist with one area of your business (like bookkeeping, accounting, marketing, etc.). If you only want help with marketing, for instance, or bookkeeping, or help with an Internet newsletter, then you want a marketing consultant, bookkeeper, or Internet writer/publisher, respectively. If you’re looking for a proper sidekick to assist you with most/all aspects of your business and/or life, and are interested in a long-term, collaborative relationship, an AssistU VA can possibly help you, and we’re happy to help you with referrals.

• AssistU VAs want to work with you long-term. That’s a huge benefit to you because you don’t have to constantly find someone new, acclimate her to you and your business, and deal with the pain of that process. And the longer a VA supports you, the easier you’ll find everything becoming for you because she’ll have information and understanding that only comes with time and first-hand experience. Long-term’s an attitude and a commitment. In the same way that you don’t get married with the active thought that you’ll try it out and get a divorce if it’s not working, you shouldn’t go into the relationship with your new VA that way. Of course, the reality is that that’s exactly what’s so—if things don’t work out for you, you can absolutely get out of the relationship. But there’s an energy behind the intention that’s different. For that reason, our Virtual Assistants don’t do “trials”. So if you want a referral to an AssistU VA, please be willing to go into the relationship with the thought that it’s going to be successful, and long-lasting and that any challenges will easily be worked through. Thoughts do become things

• Our virtual assistants assist. They back you up and make it possible for you to do more, earn more, have more. Knowing that, you will want to manage your expectations. They are not coming into your life to directly contribute to your bottom line—that’s your job. They are not coming into your life to handle, for example, the vision and implementation of your marketing program (for that you’d want a marketing professional), although they may assist with it. Do not look to them for skills at levels they probably don’t have. Basic web work, possibly. Creating and implementing a full-scale branded web identity, no way. Know the kind of professional you really need and be realistic in your expectations. AssistU VAs are fabulous, they can handle anything you throw at them, but they are not, by themselves, all the kinds of business professionals you may need, wrapped up in one neat package.

• Virtual assistance was never designed to be the low-cost alternative to hiring employees, but the efficient, effective, and convenient one. Like most other things, convenience comes at a premium. So does greater quality, which our VAs exude. The VAs in the Registry bill their clients between $40 and $100+ per hour, with $50 being about the average. As you figure out what you want to delegate and how much time per month you’re likely to need, please be sure that you can easily afford to work with a VA, long term. If you can’t, working with our VAs isn’t for you, in the same way that working with customers who can’t afford you probably isn’t appropriate for you.In case you’re curious, the difference in fees has to do with the experience of the VA, and the types of successes she helps her clients create. VAs who are expert with your profession, and our certified VAs are almost always going to have fees at the higher end of that spectrum. Please don’t ask any of them to negotiate their fees.

“If you pay peanuts you get monkeys.”
– James Goldsmith