You would probably wonder how this article landed on my blog category VA Personal Money Matters; but fact is, we all work for money, and we go by our daily needs if we have enough money coming in. So the title of this article “How to increase your VA rate” is both a personal and professional matter.
Your great motivator on why you work hard is always associated to your personal life, be that a family to sustain or just a single person goal. There is something you want to achieve in your personal life and your job remains your tool to make that happen. If you have a long list of personal goals either sending the kids to a good school, saving to buy your very own house or car, plan for that dream destination or support an ailing family member, having enough money ties those goals together.
Professional-wise if you’re building a VA business, having enough money will help you propel your plans and gain traction in scaling it. More money means more expansion. So if raising your VA rate has become an impending issue with your career lately, then allow me to shed some light on that. I feel the sentiments of most of you my VA colleagues when, in our social media group, I see you share your frustrations on your low-rated projects and how you can best get out of that situation. If you’ve been following my blog posts, you’ll see more than a couple of posts I’ve written that teach you how to treat your VA career as a business and operate on the mindset of a businessman than an employee. If you do this, you’ll feel more empowered to go after the fair-rated or even the high-rated jobs or projects you deserve. Nevertheless, let me go down to the basics here with you on how you can easily raise your VA rates.
Make a skills audit. This is the foremost thing to do. If you complain about just getting piecemeal jobs lately and with a rate that hardly gets you by, it could be because you have not raised the status of your skill level. While being well-versed with a particular skill means everything to you, at some degree you need to up your knowledge of your skill in order to further master it. The more you know, the higher your market value would be.
Follow a Rockstar VA. There are a lot of VAs whose career you might want to emulate. Not because you want to be the guy’s next competition but because you admire how his or her career is rolling out and making a difference to the client’s business and to the VA community as a source of inspiration. In fact this rockstar VA, in one way or another, could probably be coaching others on how to do the VA business right. And that is exactly what you need to do, to follow what works.
Expand your network. If you’re busy working on projects, it’s likely that you haven’t got the time to connect with other people in your VA community. There’s a lot you’re missing if you’re failing to connect with your colleagues on a regular basis. If you’re the type of VA who’s shy about asking for more money from prospective clients because they don’t know the quality of your work, a colleague or two that knows and trusts you may very well open the door to better work opportunities for you. Likewise, you get a wealth of information from job experiences of other VAs that you can apply in your own experience.
Be assertive. If you are truly aware of the quality of work than you can give your client and how your work can help his business, then you would know exactly what rate is due to you. Do not be afraid to ask for more money especially when you’re being asked to do top quality work or a series of tasks.
Leave room for better work opportunities. Let’s face it, high-rated projects don’t happen all the time, and when you’re faced with bills to pay you tend to accept the next project that comes along even if it isn’t ideal to you. There’s nothing wrong with this actually, especially when you just need to have money flowing in; but you need to leave room for better opportunities to come in. This means do not fill in your time to the max working on low-rated projects that you have no more time to market your skills, network or even accept the right kind of work. Once you’re tied up with a work contract, you would have to deal with that until it’s done.
When you are able to ask for more money commensurate to the level of your skills, you know that you have also raised the level of your business. In fact asking to be paid more compels you to do better and exceed client expectations because you just can’t afford to dissatisfy him. So take it a step at a time but make sure raising your VA rates becomes a part of your VA goals.
