This is a tricky topic but the short answer is yes, you should blog. But as a service provider, on your service provider website you should keep the blogs professional, about possible services you offer, case studies, and that type of thing.
For the most part, depending upon your niche you should leave personal anecdotes about your kids, or that client that ticked you off, out of the blog. When you first start out you are going to want to add as much content to your blog as you can but once you get filled with clients you are not going to have time, and that is perfectly okay because that means you are busy with your clients and no longer need to promote yourself as much.
Even when you get busy, try to keep the blog updated at least once a week, just to keep it fresh, but for the most part it really is perfectly fine to let go of the blog a bit after you are established. But if you are not booked solid with a waiting list, keep on blogging, keep on doing article marketing, keep working with your Search Engine Optimization, SEO to try to get more visitors and clients.
How much you should charge for your virtual assistant services depends on many factors such as your experience, your education, and your skill set. Just like a normal job!
A lot of Virtual Assistants under price themselves when they start out because they have no experience being a Virtual Assistant, but if you have been working as an administrative professional for any time at all, you have experience. If you have an education you can count that as experience. If you do volunteer work, you can count that as experience.
When you set your initial prices set them about the average wage for your area that an administrative assistant would charge where you live. Do not try to compete with people across the world, or even in another state. Your wage has more to do with where you live, and what you need to live than you might initially realize. Think about it, you would not take a job from an employer who was not offering you a living wage would you?
If you work for less than you feel you deserve you will grow resentful and feel used. Keep in mind that when you are an Independent Contractor you will be paying your own “payroll” taxes, so if you would normally take 10 dollars an hour knock that up to about 15 an hour as an Independent Contractor.
The short answer is to charge what you need to survive. So figure out how many “billable” hours you can realistically work each week, then how much you need to live. If you need $500 a week to live and you can only work 5 billable hours a day, that is 25 hours a week. You will need to charge $20.00 per hour. (this does not take into consideration taxes)
Don’t worry at first about if you have the clients yet, because you have to set up your fees, and your charges and services before you get your first client.
Tomorrow I am going to tell you about packages and how to create them which will keep you from watching the clock while you’re working, but you still need the figure above before you start figuring out the charge for your packages.
I have said I would not run a community forum because it is too hard to keep track and offer something safe and good free to you but guess what, I can offer it and it’s begun so please join. Click on Community above and join in!
Join my community on blogfrog, and let me know you’re visiting my blog, and post in the community. It’s brand new so pardon our dust.
Enjoy!
