A Top Remote Employer’s Secret Checklist: 7 proven tips to know a Remote Virtual Assistant is the Right Fit for Your Gig

Many remote employers spend considerable amount of time scouring through loads of proposals on paid up platforms to find a virtual assistant (VA) or freelancer who is a right fit for their job. It could be a lead generation expert, data entry expert, SEO expert, social media strategist, an Excel expert, a cryptocurrency writer, and a content writer among others.

One of the main reason for hiring a freelance in the first place is to free up time in order to allow you to focus on primary tasks or to support crucial aspects of your business. Search of a top freelancer should not prove a hard nut to crack or consume most of your valuable time. These tips are crucial in helping you identify top-rated and committed freelancers:

1.  Search in the right places

Do not fall a tree to find groundnuts, similarly, don’t cast your net in a forest to catch fish. Knowing the basics always matters. Common sense dictates that groundnuts are dug from the ground and fish are caught from waters. With that understanding, then move to the next step of determining the type of groundnuts or fish to harvest. Once you know the environment that Tilapia, Dog fish, Nile Perch, Mangrove Red Snapper, Tuna fish or Salmon live, then it is possible to catch the right fish. Similarly knowing where to get Runner, Virginia, Spanish and Valencia peanuts will make the search easy.

The right kind of platform will provide the right kind of freelancers you are looking for. Social media platforms are awash with all kinds of advertisements. In order to find your right fit for your job, first, start from the known platform to unknown. Begin with LinkedIn. Once you identify prospective freelancers, list them down according to the order of prominence. By prominence, I mean, the skill sets that match your job expectations. Once listed, perform due diligence. Visit their profiles on Facebook, twitter, Instagram or personal websites to corroborate the information found on LinkedIn. Once you confirm the contact details, names, websites etc. match across platforms, then you are one step away from finding the right fit for your gig.

2.  Determine the scope of work and contractual obligations

The scope of your project should be the guiding principle in determining the platforms that you can visit to identify the right freelancer for your job. The factors to consider include:

• Volume of work
• The terms of the contract to be made
• Level of complexity of the envisioned project
• Level of talent required to handle the project
• Number of manpower required for the project

A quality virtual assistant shall present his or her credentials clearly and precisely. They are willing to expose their skills, their contact details, location details, image (s), social media presence and respond to inquiries in a professional manner. Ensure that the VAs that you identify meet the criteria for selection. Do not approach a highly skilled VA for a job that requires basic skills to do and similarly do not approach a starter to handle a job that requires high technical skills. In both cases you do not get value for money. You are destined to loose in both cases. Balance skill level, experience, and job expectations to get value for money. You can gauge the expected outcomes by the level of complexity of your work. Low volume, a simple contract, minimum skill set, experience and availability should inform your selection of a starter while high volume or complexity of work, high set of skills, a complex contract, long term experience, and availability should inform your selection of an expert freelancer or virtual assistant.

3.  Understand the Value for Money Principle

Cheap is expensive and vice versa is also true. List you’re your job expectations. This should define your job category. Research on similar job categories in order to determine the appropriate price to assign your project. Do not undervalue your job post. Based on your research of similar job posts, you should be able to find an average price for your job. This will give your job credibility which in turn triggers an appropriate response from qualified virtual assistants. An undervalued project shall create an impression of a fraudulent job advertisement or employer, an employer who does not value his employees or simply a scam project. An overvalued project shall be an expensive affair and will not be value for money. An average cost shall give you an edge in the ensuing negotiations. Freelancers shall respond to your inquiries and are likely to give counter offers. The negotiation process that follows will be a win-win for both of you. The middle ground shall be acceptable and satisfying for both of you and will cement your relationship before even the contract begins to run.

4. Verify their documentation

As the competition for business intensifies, freelancers have become more professional and offer all solutions similar to local office set ups. Remote freelancers have learnt the ropes of doing business by increasingly becoming more sophisticated and able to handle all types of job requirements. Remote freelancers run duly registered businesses in their host jurisdictions, display their physical and contact addresses, official business logos, official business documents such as invoices and receipts and have mastered the impact of online presence by opening their individual or business websites, and having social media presence on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Telegram among other networking platforms. Demand to receive copies of their registration certificates, personal identification numbers, tax compliance certificates, proof of doing business such as bills, and run a multimedia communication check: by making direct audio-visual calls through provided contacts, email communication and ask for verified business referees. The referees can be previous clients or peer business contacts who are available to provide reference.

5. Have a contract in place before you start working

As soon as you agree on the terms of contract, draft a contract that is to be signed by both of you. The relevance of the contract is to provide a legal basis of doing business. You will be working under agreed upon terms that are confirmed by a contract. As stated earlier, the complexity of the contract should be determined by the volume and the technicality of the job.

6.  It is proven! Paid up job sites are not a guarantee to find quality freelancers.

You may decide to narrow your search on only paid up job sites advertised online. You may be in for a rude shock! All that glitters is not always gold. Be open minded before contracting a freelancer on a paid up platform. Those platforms may provide security for your funds but they may not guarantee quality work. Even though you will be promised value for money, the walk to heaven will indeed be a treacherous one and you may end up at hell’s gate at the end of it all. 

Most freelancers found on those paid up platforms are the same ones who advertise their businesses elsewhere. Because of the need to break even, high service fees notwithstanding, freelancers opt to join those platforms to meet prospective clients. And because of the general belief by employers that paid up platforms reduce the amount of time for them to recruit the right fit for their gigs, most of them rush to advertise their jobs on those platforms. Unbeknown to employers, they can easily spend zero money in advertisement or in paid up job adverts in order to attract better, highly skilled and experience remote virtual assistants in whatever field of expertise they are recruiting. With this kind of understanding, recruiters should no longer be imprisoned by the notion of less time, financial safety and guaranteed expertise to run to those platforms.

7.  Skillfully navigate through direct payment challenges

Remote freelancers receive funds mostly through PayPal, Skrill, Payoneer,Bank transfers and mobile payment platforms etc. These methods, in most cases, rely on trust for transactions to be completed. The best method for both the employer and the freelancer to work is to make a commitment by paying a deposit to an agreed mode of payment platform once the contract has been signed. The amount to pay may depend on the volume of work to be done. Due to past disagreements or fraudulent transactions, both freelancers and employers may take a cautious approach to handling payments. This realization has informed the decision by some job sites to allow freelancers to bring on board their direct clients to their platforms. The site only acts as a guarantor for the transaction between the direct client and the remote freelancer. The client release money to the site’s holding account as the remote freelancer handles the project. Once the contract is finalized, the site releases the funds to the freelancer only after the employer confirms receipt of work and authorize release of funds. In order to establish trust, gain confidence and establish a business relationship, the freelancers must project a trustworthy image, present all business details clearly, maintain constant communication with the client and also do due diligence on the client to ensure the transaction is above board. In most cases, trust is established after the first job goes smoothly without any hitch. Even if you gain mutual trust, always remain professional and stick to well established procedures in order to avoid any inconvenience. Most freelancers have incurred loses when employers fail to pay for the work done after they overlooked established procedures and started doing business only based on trust. Similarly, clients have also incurred losses in the past after overlooking established procedures. Genuine freelancers who value their reputation will always maintain discipline, professionalism and strive to build trust with their customers. This will guarantee them a large customer base and a constant revenue stream. Online jobs mainly depend on trust and professionalism. A small breach of these attributes is costly due to the fact that the client has all the contact details and holds a key in the form of social media sway. A bad review on social media is recipe for disaster and in most cases permanent loss of jobs.

Summary

To get the right fit for jobs, employers must scan relevant online communities and use a proper criteria to tap on the required skills. The community could be a LinkedIn page of a VA or freelancer, Facebook Page of VA, WhatsApp group, an organization, or virtual assistant website that can be used as a portal in getting a required audience. The process of scanning will not in itself result in finding the right fit. Rather, the use of interesting tips and content that is specific to make the search more scientific and appealing. Establishing a relationship with experts can be a good way of well qualified virtual assistants or freelancers.

Like any other task, recruitment of a VA is not easy. Moreover, the whole process requires well defined search patterns that will guarantee value for money.

In order to excel in remote jobs recruitment, you should also learn what you should never do to land a perfect Freelancer.  Have you been sourcing your Virtual Assistant from a wrong platform? And does it really matter?

Then discover your virtual assistant for your next data entry, web research, lead generation, office support, article writer, trade law expert, SAP CPI, P-cad, SEO/ SEM expert, and business intelligence consulting among others that can be done remotely.