Task Network is a Canadian based virtual assistant company with their head office in Toronto, Canada, and their fulfillment office in Metro Manila, Philippines. The company was founded in 2014 by founder and president Eric Opinion.

About Task Network

The company’s head office is in Toronto, Canada. The company’s directive is to provide businesses with highly-skilled, cost-effective, offshore assistants to apply their expertise to administrative support, customer support, technical support, and more.

They employ their virtual assistants in the Philippines, allowing them to offer competitive rates. This allows business owners to focus on other areas of their business while handing over tasks to skilled assistants at TaskNetwork.ca to carry out.

When you sign up with Task Network you will receive a consultation to best understand your requirements. You will then be assigned a virtual assistant with the necessary skills to carry out the work. The company puts their candidates through a screening and interview process to ensure their skills match up with your requirements, and you have a point of contact within their management team should you have any problems.

TaskNetwork Intro Video

Services

Task Network’s virtual assistants can handle a wide variety of tasks. In summary this includes:

• administrative work
• technical support
• IT support
• customer service
• ordering support
• data entry
• general ad-hoc tasks

You’re best off contacting them and giving as much detail as possible about what tasks you want to hand over and how long you expect the tasks to take. This will give you a good idea about how well equipped they are to handle your tasks, and how quickly they can turn the work around.

Plans and Pricing

The company currently has one package. This is for a full-time virtual assistant working 8 hours a day, 176 hours a month. For a quotation on price you need to contact Task Network directly as prices vary depending on the required skillset of the assistant.

Task Network Alternatives

While there are no shortage of virtual assistant companies in the Philippines, there aren’t a lot of well-known virtual assistant companies based in Canada. If you prefer to work with local companies and you’re in Canada then check out Task Network.

If you’re comfortable doing a little more of the legwork in hiring, you might consider OnlineJobs.ph, the largest virtual job board in the country, and if you don’t quite have enough work to keep a full-time VA busy, take a look at TaskBullet, which offers smaller buckets of hours that can be used over a 3 month period.

Your Turn

Have you worked with TaskNetwork.ca? If so please leave a review of your experience below to help others with their decision.

The post Task Network appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Virtual Assistant Israel provides virtual assistant services to small business owners and start-up entrepreneurs based in the US. The company was established in 2008 and employs American VAs based out of their home offices in Israel.

At the helm are co-directors Alyssa Magid and Hilary Faverman.

About VA Israel

Alyssa explained their people are what set them apart from the competition. All Virtual Assistant Israel VAs are native English speakers (most hail from the US) with college degrees and a minimum of 3-5 years of work experience, but due to not necessarily speaking Hebrew and other employment restrictions, have a hard time working for local Israeli employers. So they work online for people like you instead!

When I spoke with Alyssa, she added that they have a pretty demanding screening and testing process. What that means in terms of raw numbers is reviewing over 7,000 resumes to find the fewer than 50 top VAs that make up the Virtual Assistant Israel team today.

Virtual Assistant Israel Intro Video

Services

Virtual Assistant Israel VAs specialize in remote administrative, marketing, social media, and writing / content-creation tasks.

They have a wealth of experience in these areas and can help run your office and set-up strategic marketing plans for your business. In terms of social media, they are responsible stewards of your online brand, and can execute a social presence on the most important channels.

Each VA works on US east coast time and is available through a US-based phone number up until 5pm EST.

For full disclosure, the company also lists several services they are NOT a good fit for, including playing virtual receptionist, accounting/bookkeeping, website development, sales, and graphic design.

Plans and Pricing

With Virtual Assistant Israel, there is a one-time $199 set-up fee that gives you access to interview as many candidates from their pool of available VAs as you like. Alyssa explained the fee primarily serves to weed out tire-kickers who maybe aren’t as serious about adding a team member. She also offered $100 off for VAA visitors:

VAA Exclusive: Mention VirtualAssistantAssistant.com during sign-up or on your intro call and get $100 off your Virtual Assistant Israel set-up fee.

Normally how it works is prospective clients have an intro call with the management team to assess their needs and delegation opportunity in their business, and are provided with 3 VAs to interview. After the interviews, you pick your favorite and begin the relationship with your new dedicated assistant.

If it’s not working out within the first couple weeks, your set-up fee is 100% refundable.

The company has a couple different price tiers that are dependent upon the skills and level of experience you require from your VA. The first tier is $26-30/hour and the higher level tier is $34-39/hour. There’s a 10-hour per month minimum engagement, but other than that no contracts or long-term commitments.

Once you engage, your virtual assistant uses Freshbooks to track their working time to the second and invoices you only for the time they spend. In that manner, you don’t have to worry about unused hours in a month or counting tasks.

Virtual Assistant Israel Alternatives

With VAI, you have the advantage of an experienced, professional dedicated assistant. Along those lines, there are a few other companies that might be worthy of your consideration, including Time Etc and other US-based VA companies.

Have you worked with Virtual Assistant Israel? If so, please share a quick review of your experience below to help others with their decision.

The post Virtual Assistant Israel appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Founded in 2012 by SJ Josenna, GlobalMaxline.co.uk is a virtual assistant company in India with sales offices in the United States and London. The service targets small business owners and busy professionals, with both task-based assistance and dedicated hourly plans.

Global Max Line claims to go above and beyond with a truly professional and elite level of business assistance. The service not only helps with small tasks but is designed to help you develop and grow your business and achieve long-term growth goals.

Services

GlobalMaxline.co.uk (formerly GlobalMaxLine.org) assists small and medium level CEOs to reduce their work load and focus on the bigger picture priorities. The company targets UK-based businesses.

Busy doctors and other medical professionals, real estate professionals, educators, and every busy person who needs assistance could benefit from their menu of services, which include:

• Administration: Assisting clients with data entry, research tasks, and more.
• Transcription: Delivering accurate Word document or text files from any audio and video file
• 3^rd Party Services: Making calls on your behalf
• Marketing Support: Including CRM (customer relationship management), internet marketing, advertising
• Customer Service: Online website chat, email and phone support
• Online Shopping: Place orders and schedule deliveries
• Healthcare Services, Virtual Assitant, Mortgage Services, Real Estate, Church Services and Web & App Development

How GlobalMaxline.org Works

To make sure your task is completed as you need, GlobalMaxline.org has developed a three step process to effectively complete your assignments.

1. Develop Functional Plan: A Global Max Line senior staff member will help you develop a functional plan that is sustainable and actionable. This is actually really valuable for first-time virtual assistant employers.
2. Regular Updates: Your virtual project manager will develop a series of milestones and delivery dates to ensure your projects finish on schedule.
3. Quality Check: All services and ideas are checked for quality and for accuracy within your industry before being sent out.

Naturally, for task-based work, your requests go into a general queue and the first available qualified assistant takes care of it for you, up to the advertised 15-minute time limit.

With the dedicated service, you can use as many hours as you have available to you in your plan each month, and there is no limit on how long certain tasks can take.

Plans and Pricing

Global Max Line splits their offering into three main plans: Max Basic, Max Premium, and Max Platinum.

All plans are sold on a monthly subscription model.

VirtualAssistantAssistant Exclusive: Mention referral code VAA for 10% off your first month!

At the entry level, the Max Basic plan is just £150 a month and includes up to 10 hours of support (£15/hour).

The popular Max Premium option is £399 for up to 30 hours of assistance (£13.30 an hour).

And finally, the Max Platinum option is £599 a month and includes up to 50 hours of support and priority turnaroun of your tasks (£11.98/hour).

GlobalMaxline Alternatives

GlobalMaxline.org aims to provide cost-effective, flexible, and easy-to-use virtual assistant service, but they certainly aren’t the only game in town. For dedicated hourly VA service in India, you have tons of choices. The most popular on VAA to date have been My Tasker and 24/7 Virtual Assistant.

Another interesting entry worth checking out for UK clients is AVirtual.co.uk, based in Cape Town, South Africa.

Have you worked with GlobalMaxline.co.uk? If so, please share a quick review of your experience below to help others with their decision.

The post Global Max Line appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

eaHELP is a virtual executive assistant company that employs exclusively US-based assistants. The company got its start in 2010 helping churches and pastors outsource their administrative work, and has since expanded to serve businesses (small & large) nationwide.

eaHELP executive assistants are administrative professionals trained in a variety of support tasks. Their goal is to match you with a virtual assistant who will work cohesively with you and your existing team even though they’ll be working remotely. eaHELP strongly believes that every leader thrives with the support of an intentionally matched VA.

Services

Some of the more common jobs eaHELP VAs do include scheduling and travel planning, research, preparing presentations, social media admin, project management, and other ongoing business support functions. The idea is to let someone else handle what they’re good at, so you can focus your time on what you’re good at — or what you need to do to grow your business.

In 2015, eaHELP has also introduced a social media assistant service to help you make the most of the most relevant social media channels for your business. They’ll help you develop your social strategy, produce and publish content, and promote your business in a savvy, non-spammy way.

The eaHELP model is known as a “staff leasing” arrangement. Where other virtual assistant companies may assign your tasks to whoever is available at the moment, eaHELP gives you a dedicated/assigned assistant so you can build a one-on-one relationship and gain the efficiencies that come with it.

eaHELP Review

The company offers monthly service plans in 5-hour per week increments. The most popular plan to start out with for small businesses, entrepreneurs, or people who just want to take a test drive is the baseline 5-hour a week plan. The sign-up process begins with a free consultation and personalized price quote.

A flat monthly fee gives you access to you VA week in and week out, without having to worry about overhead, timesheets, and billing headaches. Modest discounts are available for scaling up the engagement, and you can change plans at any time given reasonable notice.

Plans and Pricing

As you might expect, eaHELP is considerably more expensive than many of the overseas virtual assistant options. In some parts of the world, you may even be able to find a full-time virtual employee for a lower monthly fee. But eaHELP believes you get what you pay for, and clearly isn’t targeting the same customer who’s looking for the $5/hour VA.

As of July 2016, their hourly rates range from $35 – $45.

The good thing is that these rates are “all-inclusive,” in that you don’t have any additional employer burden costs to pay on top of it, like you would with a traditional W-2 employee. If you are a non-profit or a church, lower rates may be available.

Bryan Miles, the founder of eaHELP, is focused on delivering superior service to his customers. The strategy seems to be paying off, with business growing rapidly and a host of marquee clients. In fact, the company has earned glowing endorsements from author Michael Hyatt and other Fortune 500 companies.

I had the chance to sit down with Bryan and ask him a few questions on what sets eaHELP apart from the competition, who their target customers are, what areas of work they specialize, and who should NOT use their service.

eaHELP Founder Interview

With so many changes in our economy and hiring strategies, Bryan argues it may be time to rethink your approach to staffing. In fact, he gives 9 reasons to consider going virtual for your next hire in his free ebook (email opt-in required, but worth the read).

Press and Awards

In 2015, eaHELP was named the 131st fastest growing company in America by Inc. Magazine, earning a spot in the prestigious Inc. 500 list.

eaHELP Alternatives

A few other virtual assistant companies operate on a similar model with home-based American assistants, including top-rated firms like Time Etc and Worldwide101. Worldwide101 has similar (though more transparent/flexible) pricing options, and Time Etc is the most affordable of the three.

Employee Burden Infographic

Your Turn

Have you worked with eaHELP? If so, please consider sharing a short review below to help others with their decision.

The post eaHELP appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

YourDailyTasks (formerly YourDailyTask) is a virtual assistant company based in Mumbai, India with a sales office in the UK. The firm was established in 2008 and has grown to a team of nearly 200 virtual assistants serving over 6000 clients worldwide.

They’re open 24/7, and target a more business-oriented client base, as opposed to individuals and sole proprietors.

Your Daily Tasks Services

YourDailyTasks offers a wide variety of outsourced work services, including IT support, web and graphic design, accounting, transcription, search engine and social media marketing, and more.

Of course, you’ll also find standard administrative and virtual assistant support as well.

Beyond these services, YourDailyTasks has special packages just for email marketing, 24-hour live chat support, and even a dedicated Twitter account manager.

Related: Should You Outsource Social Media? 

In this way, your VA can be an asset to your team in interacting with customers and helping answer their questions via live chat on your site, email, or even Twitter.

MBA Virtual Assistants are available for special projects like market research, competitor analysis and finance management.

YourDailyTasks have self-hosted task management tool based on ActiveCollab (they call it Portal) where you can assign tasks, track hours and communicate with your virtual assistant(s). If you prefer, you can also assign tasks via email, chat, Skype, or phone.

How it Works

Plans and Pricing

Pricing for a YourDailyTasks virtual assistant begins at $8.99 per hour for their 10-hour plan. As you might expect, the rates decrease as you buy more time.

The popular 20-hour a month plan is just $159.80, or $7.99 an hour, and a full-time dedicated VA is only $958.40, just $5.99 an hour!

All the small plans up to 40 hours are task-based and you will be only charged if you assign a task. The 80 and 160-hour plans doesn’t expire at the end of month; your hours rollover and you have up to 6 months to use them.

(Obviously try and delegate 700 hours worth of work to your dedicated assistant in month 6!)

YourDailyTasks will also quote project-based work is your needs don’t justify an ongoing virtual assistant.

Your Daily Tasks Alternatives

YourDailyTasks is a well-established, affordable, and long-running Indian VA company, but they’re not the only game in town. If you’re shopping around, you might consider My Tasker as well, though their rates are slightly higher.

Your Turn

Have you worked with YourDailyTasks? If so, please share a review of your experience below.

The post YourDailyTasks appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Worldwide101 is an international premium virtual assistant company with clients and assistants in North America and Europe.

Founded in 2009, Worldwide101 supports demanding founders and executives by providing skilled virtual assistants that can take on responsibility, and represent the founder and their business.

About Worldwide101

Founder of Worldwide101, Sandra Lewis, explained, “Our approach is very personalized, carefully matching team members with clients based on skills and personality. The team member assigned learns the client’s business and becomes an integral part of their operations.”

She added that Worldwide101 offers a variety of skills under one virtual roof. “We’ve listened carefully to clients over the years and assembled a team with the variety of skills that clients need as they grow. Why should a client have to find an assistant, and then find a web developer, and then find a bookkeeper?”

The service is built for established companies that are at the ceiling of their capacity, and aims to relieve the talent burden as well as the recruiting burden.

“The time it takes to find competent, reliable people when you are already full-on is prohibitive,” Sandra told me. “Instead, with Worldwide101 clients have immediate access to a team of tried and tested professionals with all the skills they need, when they need them.”

Overview with the Founder

Services

Worldwide101’s vision is to be the “go-to-company” for reliable, quality virtual support of all kinds.

Many of their clients originally sign on for admin support, marketing help, or customer service, but the company also specializes in providing businesses with multilingual support with native speakers (French, German, Dutch, Spanish, Italian, etc.).

Here’s a list of the common services offered by Worldwide101:

• C-level executive assistance
• Marketing and social media management
• Project management
• Content writing and editing
• Bookkeeping
• Customer service
• Bilingual customer service and admin

It’s a relief for many clients to know they have a trusted and responsive company they can call on for web development, design, project management, bookkeeping, etc.

How it Works

Worldwide101 has a simple premise. They only recruit people that are passionate about doing a good job, and passionate about working from home– people that share the belief in going the extra mile in order to retain that privilege.

That, and every VA they hire has a minimum of 7 years of executive assistant experience!

Sandra explained: “We recruit people that have an innate sense of service, and we find that the motivation of continuing to work virtually from home, translates into team members that shine. At Worldwide101 ‘your success is our success’ is not a cliché. It’s true and we live by it. Worldwide101 has the capacity to grow with your business, and respond to fluctuations in your staffing needs.”

All clients have a dedicated team member assigned to them (typically for admin support, customer service, marketing, or project management), as well as access to a broader team when additional services are needed such as web development, design, bookkeeping etc.

The company also trains a backup VA in case of illness, etc. This ensures continuity and provides a level of care and reliability for customers.

VA Company Comparison Chart

*Specialist services are available for an additional charge.

(In this article, Worldwide101 explains why they’ve chosen not to offer rollover hours or a free trial.)

Clients

The clientele of Worldwide 101 is generally more business-focused, although support is offered to individuals that need an ongoing assistant or need support for a ‘more involved’ project. For example, the company often works with people who are relocating to another country and need support with research and making complex arrangements in another language.

The average customer signs on for around 15-20 hours a week, but a wide range of customizable options are available.

One thing I found interesting was that many clients turn to Worldwide after a less-than-ideal experience with a lower cost VA service to see if a premium executive assistant can make a difference. If you’ve tried outsourcing overseas before and weren’t happy with the results, perhaps its time to try a higher-end service.

Worldwide101 Client Case Study

Plans and Pricing

In terms of pricing, Worldwide101 has package rates for admin services, and hourly rates for more specialized services such as development and design.

Packages start at $43 per hour, while discounts may be available for long-term engagements.

And again, per Sandra, the 3 areas that set Worldwide101 apart from the competition:

1. Our People.

Reliability and quality are EVERYTHING.

We recruit people that have an outstanding professional background and a great attitude – people that have made the transition from a corporate career to working from home, and who bring a wealth of training and experience with them.

Clients get the best of both worlds – a team member with extensive experience, available to them when they need it.

2. A Personal Service.

We really get to know our clients and assign an assistant that will be a perfect match. We stay attuned to clients needs so that we can grow with them, and are flexible enough to adjust as needed.

Need a service that we don’t currently offer? No problem, we’ll add it for you.

3. A Hybrid Model.

Many providers offer either a team-based service, or a dedicated service. We offer a hybrid model where clients can have a dedicated assistant and take advantage of an extended team for additional services.

Worldwide101 Alternatives

For European (UK) assistants or US-based support, check out Time Etc, a well-rated alternative that operates on a similar model with slightly lower rates.

If you have a specific skillset in mind, you might consider posting the job on Upwork and seeing what comes back. I like to cast a wide net and compare candidates in interviews to see who might be the best fit.

Your Turn

Have you worked with Worldwide101? If so, please take a moment to share a quick review of your experience below to help others with their decision.

The post Worldwide101 appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Remote Workmate is an Australian-registered virtual staffing solutions company that puts a spotlight exclusively on outstanding Filipino virtual assistants.

The company has been known to some since 2008 when Australians John Paul Grant and Matt Canty, who were then based within the Philippines, started offering multiple forms of virtual assistant services to entrepreneurs and business owners.

About Remote Workmate

In 2014, Darwin-based Chris Whitrod, the current company CEO, bought the name Remote Workmate from Paul and Matt and focused on providing long-term, dedicated virtual assistants with ongoing support as the company’s main form of service to entrepreneurs and businesses primarily from Australia, New Zealand, North America, and Europe.

Remote Workmate Services

Remote Workmate provides virtual assistant recruitment plus ongoing client support with no lock-in.

Their recruitment process requires 1-2 weeks or until the client is happy with their selection. Remote Workmate provides unlimited HR support and payroll management while the client takes care of the virtual assistant task delegation.

If in the unlikely case that the client is unhappy with the performance of the person they hired, they can ask for a replacement for no additional processing or recruitment cost!

Remote Workmate aims to work on roles specific to their client needs as opposed to the pre-packaged role descriptions. If they think that the expectations that clients have are quite impossible, they make recommendations on how to make it more realistic.

Based on their past experiences, here are some of the most usual type of roles that they have helped clients fill:

• Social Media Marketing Specialist
• SEO Specialist
• AdWords Expert
• Content Writer
• Virtual Administrative Assistant
• Telemarketer/Appointment Setter
• Real Estate Virtual Administrative Assistant
• Property Management Assistant
• Graphic Designer
• WordPress Expert
• Business Development Specialist
• Customer Service Specialist
• Recruitment Specialist
• Bookkeeper

All Remote Workmate virtual assistants are working from home and comply with certain equipment standards like minimum internet connection speed and ideal computer specifications. They work for a minimum of 20 hours per week promoting better and longer working relationship with their clients.

How it Works

Remote Workmate’s hiring process is pretty straight forward. The company works closely with their clients from the discovery call and allows them to take part in the recruitment process as much as they want.

After the discovery call, the recruiting specialists hit the trail and try to find the best possible candidates from their network. They’ll present those assistant profiles to you, and you can schedule interviews with the ones that look most promising.

Plans and Pricing

Remote Workmate does not have a “one-size fits all” pricing plan. As the company strives to have experienced virtual assistants take interest in open roles, the rates are then driven by their skillset and years of experience.

On their website, Remote Workmate gives a rough idea of the average rate for each type of role, in USD:

• Social Media Manager $7.00 – $8.50
• Graphic Designer/Web/PHP Developer $9.00 – $11.00
• General Virtual Assistant $6.00 – $7.50
• Marketing Assistant $6.50 – $7.50
• Content Writer $6.50 – $7.50
• SEO Specialist $9.00 – $11.00
• Customer Service Specialist $6.00 – $7.00
• Payroll Officer/Bookkeeper $6.00 – $8.00
• Content Writer $6.50 – $8.00
• Real Estate Virtual Assistant $6.00 – $7.50

If you’d like to have an idea of what the ballpark rate would be for a role specific to your requirements, you can email them at hire@remoteworkmate.com.

So what’s included in the rates?

• The recruitment process
• The replacement process (if requested)
• VA Pay
• HR & payroll management
• Client consultant (client’s go-to person)
• Time tracking software

Each client receives one billing invoice per month on a pre-payment basis. Payments are done via bank-to-bank transfer, Transferwise, or Paypal.

Why Remote Workmate?

One thing that stands out with Remote Workmate’s service is the freedom to end it if you are unhappy for any reason at all. That speaks volumes as to how confident they are with the quality of service they can provide.

Since they have quite an extensive recruitment process, with 3 out of 4 stages allotted to it, you can rest assured that they won’t stop trying to find a VA you’ll be happy with until you say so. By the time you are working with a VA and you feel that you’ve selected the wrong one, you always have that free replacement to fall back to.

Remote Workmate Alternatives

Remote Workmate is an interesting model that falls between the do-it-yourself recruiting model of OnlineJobs.ph (where you’ll pay a small upfront fee to access the job board, and likely a lower monthly rate ongoing), the straight-up recruiting service of Virtual Staff Finder (where you pay a bigger upfront fee and likely a lower monthly salary ongoing), and a managed VA company like VA Staffer (where you’ll pay a higher monthly fee in return for a dedicated office facility and on-site infrastructure).

Your Turn

Have you worked with Remote Workmate? If so, please share a quick review of your experience below and help others with their decision.

The post Remote Workmate appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

OkayRelax is a new task-based virtual assistant company based in Tampa, Florida. The business was founded in 2015 with a mission to help busy people save some time and sanity.

About Okay Relax

OkayRelax operates on kind of a hybrid model between a dedicated virtual assistant service and a task-based approach where any available team member can tackle your assignments. The service is set-up around tasks, mini-projects up to 30 minutes, but unlike competitors Fancy Hands and Efficise, you are assigned a dedicated assistant.

While a distributed team approach does have certain advantages, the founders of OkayRelax felt there were some major problems with it as well. For example, if you’re constantly explaining repetitive tasks to new VAs, you’re never gaining any efficiency or process improvement ideas. Plus, if you’re sharing sensitive data or login information, you don’t want that spread around to an army of anonymous virtual assistants.

OkayRelax assistants work from home and serve (English-speaking) clients worldwide. The company’s proprietary screening and training process makes sure they can deliver exceptional service.

Services

OkayRelax handles a range of virtual assistant tasks, but they really do focus on your individual needs as opposed to the needs of your business or company. For example, they can book you a table at a local restaurant if you’ve forgotten to make a reservation or they could recommend an activity for you if you’re not quite sure what to do next weekend.

Clients rely on their OK Relax assistant to help with online research for upcoming travel or product purchases, or administrative tasks like email and calendar management, data entry, or dealing with customer service on your behalf.

OkayRelax Video Review

Plans and Pricing

OkayRelax plans start at $29.95 a month for a 5 task plan. For comparison, Fancy Hands is also $30 for the same 5 tasks.

The popular 25-task plan runs $94.95 per month and heavy users can outsource unlimited tasks under the OkayRelax Unlimited plan for $399.95 per month.

If you max out the 30-minute per task guideline, you’re looking at equivalent labor rates as low as $12 an hour on the Starter plan, $8 an hour for the Professional plan, and theoretically as low as $2.50 an hour for the Executive plan (assuming you max out a full 160-hour work month).

You can assign tasks of up to 2.5 hours, and they’ll just charge 5 credits from your account. This is super handy because they recognize that not all jobs fit into nice 15-30 minute chunks.

These rates have increased 25-50% since I recorded the video, but are still quite affordable.

OkayRelax Alternatives

OkayRelax follows in the footsteps of other task-based virtual assistant companies, but with their own unique twist. As mentioned above, Efficise, Fancy Hands, and Perssist all operate similar models, though without the dedicated assistant.

In fact, I’m having a hard time thinking of another service that offers a dedicated VA for less than $100 a month.

Your Turn

Have you worked with OkayRelax before? Please leave a review below to help others with their decision.

The post OkayRelax appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

OnlineJobs.ph is a Filipino job board that caters exclusively to remote online work opportunities. It was created in 2009 by Utah-based entrepreneur John Jonas as a way to connect the affordable Filipino workforce with business owners in North America and around the world.

If that name sounds familiar, it’s for good reason. Jonas is also the guy behind Replace Myself, a leading outsourcing education membership service.  In a relatively short amount of time, OnlineJobs.ph has attracted a large user-base of both virtual assistants and employers.

About OnlineJobs

The beauty of OnlineJobs is in their powerful filtering system. It’s basically a resume database, and you can filter by the date the listing was created, skills required, the level of skill (very important), and desired salary.

According to the experts, the most important filters are to choose only resumes updated within the last month, and strong English writing skills. The logic behind these selections is that the ones with older resumes will either already have jobs or they aren’t great candidates.

For the English skills, writing is a great indicator of overall understanding, comprehension, and communication skills. If your virtual assistant has that baseline knowledge, you can train them in whatever you need done.

OnlineJobs.ph Review

OnlineJobs.ph recently added a new metric called ID Proof. It’s not a measure of skill or reliability, but a 1-100 rating of to what degree the candidate is who they say they are. Apparently it’s a common practice to create multiple profiles under fake personas to hedge your bets and theoretically give yourself a better chance of getting an application noticed.

In general, I’ve found the higher the ID Proof number, the more professional the candidate. It’s a measure of how seriously they’re staking their reputation online. I wouldn’t immediately rule someone out who has a low score here, but choosing between two equally qualified candidates, I’d go with the one with the higher ID Proof for sure.

Video Overview with the Founder

Plans and Pricing

The way OnlineJobs makes money is on a subscription-based pricing model, where it is $49 a month to be able to contact the workers. You can do all the filtering and searching you want, but you can’t communicate with the workers until you pay.

Considering the potential long-term cost savings over a virtual assistant company in the Philippines or elsewhere, it’s still a strong value proposition.

Discounts are available for extended membership terms, but unless you need to build a large team or are using it as a recruiter, it shouldn’t take  you that long to find a suitable selection.

For instance, I posted a virtual assistant job recently and was inundated with responses overnight. From more than 70 candidates, I picked my top 10 to send some trial tasks. Five or six completed those and I picked my top 2 for a Skype video interview. All done in less than a week.

As an alternative, you can get OnlineJobs.ph access for “free” if you buy into the Replace Myself training program, starting at $97 per month.

Virtual Assistant Tracking

OnlineJobs has introduced a piece of software called TimeProof to track the working hours of your remote team members. It’s completely free to use (currently in beta), and aims to provide a level of protection and verification for both workers and employers.

As the employer, you’ll get time sheets and screenshots of what your VA was working on during their shift.

OnlineJobs.ph Alternatives

A popular alternative a while ago was a site called BestJobs.ph — but for some unknown reason, they’re are no longer accepting job posts from international employers. In fact, my account was banned with no explanation or warning after posting just one (completely legit) VA job there.

Today you’re left with the alternatives of the Craigslist crapshoot, finding a freelancer, or potentially contracting with Virtual Staff Finder to do the legwork for you.

Related: Upwork vs. OnlineJobs.ph

Your Turn

Have you had any experience with finding a VA on OnlineJobs.ph? If so, please share it here and help others with their decision.

The post OnlineJobs.ph appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Hired is a US-based company specializing connecting clients with engineers, designers, data scientist, and product managers.

Hired uses intelligent AI to match clients with talented candidates in their database. The results are delivered straight to your mailbox to browse in just a few hours.

About Hired

Hired was started by three successful entrepreneurs; Matt Mickiewicz, founder of 99Designs and Flippa, Douglas Feirstein, founder of LiveOps, and Allan Grant, founder of Curebit.

They have been in business since May, 2012, and received a Seed Round of $2.7 million in funding in January 2013 from a group of investors.

The company is based in San Francisco, California, and also have an office in London. They have more than 500 employees, with most working from their San Francisco offices.

Their target customers are companies looking to hire engineers, designers, data scientist, and product managers, as these are their specialist areas. These aren’t your typical “virtual assistant” roles, but could be important positions to fill on your growing team, and you can hire remotely on the platform.

How it Works

Hired say that more than 70,000 candidates complete a profile every month, with less than 5% being accepted.

The accepted candidates have their details mailed out to prospective employers, it’s then up to the employers to make contact if they want more information on the candidate.

Their main objective is to speed up the recruiting process. Hired say they decrease the time-to-fill by 38% over conventional hiring channels, with clients filling their positions in an average of 25 days for full-time employees, and 10 days for contractors.

Using their marketplace employers also decrease their cost-per-hire by 27%. You are given visibility over the salary ranges of competing companies so you can make an informed and compelling offer.

Services

Hired operates a marketplace for employers to find skilled staff.

You can find full-time, part-time, or contractors and their AI sends you prospective candidates within hours of you making a request.

As a job seeker, you’re able to apply to be added to the Hired database using your LinkedIn profile.

Each week Hired approves the candidates they feel are most suitable, they are then coached by one of their Talent Advocates through the processes they have in place to be noticed by employers.

But here’s the kicker for solopreneurs and other boostrapped business owners: companies recruiting through the Hired marketplace must be either publicly traded or venture-funded.

Based on the skillsets of the candidates specified they are sent a list of the best fitting candidates.

Hired also also give transparency into offers from other companies so employers can make an informed offer, benefiting both the employer and the candidate.

Plans and Pricing

• Employers using the Hired marketplace to recruit have the option to pay a one-time commission fee of 15% of their new hire’s annual salary, or they can pay a fixed monthly fee and hire as many candidates as they wish.
• The rate of hiring temporary employees is 30%, and 15% for independent contractors.
• For exact pricing you need to contact Hired directly.

Hired Alternatives

Upwork is the largest online marketplace for freelance talent, although you have to do all the vetting of candidates yourself and it’s more geared toward project work vs. ongoing employment like Hired.

There are various US-based virtual assistant companies that can offer full or part-time assistants on a long term basis.

Your Turn

Have you worked with Hired? If so, please leave a review below to help others with their decision.

The post Hired appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

UPDATE: 24/7 has become unresponsive. I would avoid them and consider an alternative VA company.

24/7 Virtual Assistant is a personal outsourcing company with locations in Atlanta, Georgia and India. The company has been in business since 2008, and has attracted clients all across the country and around the world.

247VirtualAssistant.com is geared toward the small business customer, with several dedicated plans starting at 30 hours a month for $299 ($10/hour) and going all the way up to full time 160 hours a month for $999 ($6.25/hour). The 30-hour plan is the most popular offering.

About 24/7 VA

The advantage of these plans is a dedicated virtual assistant you can train to the specific needs of your business. If you don’t need so much time, 24/7 Virtual Assistant also sells hourly pay-as-you-go plans for $15 an hour in 5-hour increments.

You can take advantage of the services offered by 24/7 Virtual Assistant, regardless of the type of business you have or even if you just need someone to deal with your personal tasks. The services offered range from clerical and secretarial tasks, such as responding to messages or calls, to web research, customer service, human resources, and real estate services. They even do web design for just $20 an hour.

In addition to their offshore center in India, 24/7 offers US-based staffing as well from their Atlanta headquarters. The rates are outstanding for dedicated American help, starting at just $359 for a 20-hour per month VA. There are a variety of plans depending on how many hours you need, and you can even get a full-time US-based virtual employee for only $1999 a month.

247VirtualAssistant.com Review

Virtual Assistant Assistant Exclusive: Mention referral code 2ni4ck7 for 10% off your first month!

The virtual assistants from 24/7 Virtual Assistant also offer services which are extremely creative and technical. These could be managing your technical calls from important clients and helping with computer related issues. You can get help from creative VAs who are able to design programs for Internet marketing campaigns. You get to train them as if they were a real employee.

You can also use these assistants as customer support staff to answer calls from potential customers.  This service is offered at very affordable cost and you are not required to sign a contract.   What’s even more interesting the service is offered on a month to month basis, so you can unsubscribe at any time without incurring a penalty.

24/7 VA Video Interview

Virtual Assistant Assistant Exclusive: Mention referral code 2ni4ck7 for 10% off your first month!

Since launching this site, 24/7 has been one of the most popular companies around. The competitive rates and diverse skill-sets of the team are a major contributing factor, but the behind-the-scenes service is important too.

My main contact there has been very responsive to  customer questions and concerns, even working to create custom solutions or handling some of the workload himself until a more permanent set-up can be established. I think an important measure is the speed at which customer issues are resolved, and it’s been my experience that Thomas (my contact) and his team genuinely care about delivering a great service and doing whatever they can to make it right for their clients.

Is that a guarantee? No, but you can learn more about my personal trial with 24/7 in the video above or in the comments down below. I had the opportunity to test out their 30-hour plan for a month.

24/7 Virtual Assistant Alternatives

My Tasker or VMG BPO are well-rated alternatives with similar pricing structures and a dedicated + team-access approach.

Your Turn

Have you used 24/7 Virtual Assistant? Please share your experience below.

The post 24/7 Virtual Assistant appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

VA Talks is a professional virtual assistant provider in India with 24/7 support. The company was formed in 2015 by two veteran virtual assistants who decided to start their own firm.

Despite the inherent “new-ness” of the VA Talks company, the founding partners bring nearly a decade of business process outsourcing experience to the table and are growing a team to serve other entrepreneurs and small businesses around the world.

About VA Talks

The goal of VA Talks is to help other companies get their most important tasks done. The team is working from the secure office in Kolkata, India.

Like other virtual assistant companies, they want to earn your trust so you have confidence in the experience and quality of VAs they provide. The target market for these services are for busy individuals, entrepreneurs, small businesses or large corporations interested in freeing up some time or getting access to skilled help for their day-to-day needs.

Services

VA Talks virtual assistants can perform nearly any type of task you might think of online. Whether you require bookkeeping services, administrative tasks, web development, design or search engine optimization, skilled VAs are available to help you.

In addition, clients tap the VA Talks team to help design mobile apps, run marketing efforts, create presentations and proposals, and to do research.

When I spoke with one of the founders, CEO Sanjay (Sam) Gupta — no, not that Sanjay Gupta — he explained that they recruit team members with a variety of skills, but that, “Some of our most in demand VAs are proficient in WordPress, Joomla, Magento, Drupal, and many other web development platforms. Our Web team is our main focus but we do have virtual assistants capable of helping nearly any type of company or individual.”

VA Talks Founder Interview

Plans and Pricing

VA Talks pricing starts as low as $130 for 10 hours per month ($13/hour). The larger plan you buy, the lower the effective hourly rate, all the way down to less than $7 an hour for a full-time dedicated VA ($1100/month).

But don’t bite off more hours than you need just for the sake of saving money; unused hours don’t rollover month-to-month.

If you need our services for under 10 hours a month, they have a Pay As You Use plan for on-demand support at just $15/hour.

All plans except the pay-as-you-go plan come with a 2-hour free trial to test out the service.

VAA Exclusive: Use referral code VAAFULL10VAT for 10% off your first month of full-time assistance.

VA Talks Alternatives

When I asked Sam what sets his team apart, he explained, “It’s fairly easy to find a workforce of VAs that are willing to work. But VA Talks goes the extra mile to find staff that will deliver quality work.”

He went on to share that all of the VAs on the team “are our friends who are hand-selected for our clients to service their needs. We work to provide not only the best quality labor in our industry but also customer experiences that will have you consistently coming back for more.”

As far as alternative choices, as you know, you have many virtual assistant companies in India to choose from. Among the top-rated at the time of this writing are 24/7 Virtual Assistant and My Tasker.

Have you worked with VATalks? If so, please be sure to share a review of your experience below to help others with their decision.

The post VA Talks appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

The Virtual Hub is a virtual assistant company based in the Philippines. Since 2015, they’ve specialized in recruiting virtual assistants and providing continual support and training to strengthen the relationship between you and your assistant.

The company is headed up by founder and CEO Barbara Turley. Barbara is based in Australia, while all their virtual assistants, known as “angels”, work remotely from their homes in the Philippines.

About The Virtual Hub

The Virtual Hub (formerly Virtual Angel Hub) give emphasis to training both their clients and virtual assistants. This is something not often by virtual assistant providers, and is described as a “game changer” on their website.

Before you are introduced to their virtual assistants their team work with you to better understand your business to make sure you’re ready for an assistant. They have a series of training videos to help you get ready for your assistant, outline some tasks you need to carry out, and even give you some tips on how to scale your business.

The Virtual Hub then connects you with a number of virtual assistants that will be a good match for you based on your requirements. You choose which assistant you want to hire, the assistant is overseen by a supervisor and undergoes continual training to ensure they are supporting you at the highest level possible.

Although marketed toward Australian entrepreneurs and small business owners, you can sign up with The Virtual Hub from anywhere in the world. The Philippines and Australia are in similar time zones, so I can see that scheduling working hours would be easy from Australia, but arrangements can be discussed for your time zone if you contact them.

Services

The Virtual Hub’s virtual assistants offer a wide range of professional services. The unique angle to their business model is the ongoing training they provide their assistants. So, whatever your requirements or tasks are, you can communicate with your assistant and their supervisor to arrange training in your processes and business.

The Virtual Hub Founder Interview

Note: The video references Virtual Angel Hub. The company has since re-branded.

Plans and Pricing

The Virtual Hub has two pricing plans, Part-Time/Full-Time and Advanced.

Their prices are in Australian dollars, but I will include the approximate American dollar equivalent at the exchange rate as I’m writing this. The cost of each plan is as follows:

• Part-Time/Full-Time – $10 AUD/hour ($7 USD), plus a $297 AUD ($225 USD) setup fee.
• Advanced – $14 AUD/hour ($10.50 USD), plus a $297 AUD ($225 USD) setup fee.

When you choose a Part-Time/Full-Time plan you can have your VA work either 20 or 40 hours a week. You will have access to a dedicated staff team leader, time tracking software, online project management tools, their online training videos, access to their “Expert Resource Hub”, and of course the virtual assistant you chose to work with.

The Advanced plan includes all the services in the Part-Time/Full-Time, with the addition of a Infusionsoft/Ontraport/Active Campaign/Podio trained assistant, along with access to systems integration specialists.

If you prefer an office-based assistant, The Virtual Hub can help you there as well. For an extra $3 AUD per hour, your VA will work from one of the company’s secure and managed office locations in the Philippines.

The Virtual Hub Alternatives

There is no shortage of virtual assistant companies with their VAs operating out of the Philippines. If you’re comfortable or enjoy doing the recruiting work yourself, check out OnlineJobs.ph.

Task Bullet is another service with good ratings and a unique “bucket” pricing model without any long-term commitments.

Your Turn

Have you worked with The Virtual Hub or Virtual Angel Hub? If so, please leave a review below to help others with their decision.

The post The Virtual Hub (formerly Virtual Angel Hub) appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

UPDATE: It appears A to Z Tasks is out of business. Please consider one of these alternatives.

A to Z Tasks is US-based virtual assistant company with an offshore office located in Bangladesh. Their 300-person facility is in Dhaka, a city with great high-tech infrastructure and that is home to many call centers and technology companies.

A to Z Tasks has been providing outsourcing services since 2008, and serves clients around the world. Among their recognizable customers are Toyota, Subway, Verizon, and Century 21. If these large brands trust A to Z with their data and workload, there’s no question they can provide serious value for smaller companies, entrepreneurs, and busy individuals.

Virtual assistants from A to Z Tasks can perform any number of helpful functions, including general administrative tasks like responding to emails to website maintenance and customer service. You can even train your assistant to accomplish routine business processes and free up more of your time.

The most attractive A to Z Tasks plan is their full-time dedicated “virtual employee” plan, which is $995 for 160 hours a month (approx. $6.20 an hour).  If you need less time, smaller plans are available ranging from 30 hours a month to 80 hours a month at rates between $8 and $10 an hour.  These rates make A to Z Tasks very competitive among other virtual assistant companies.

A to Z Tasks offers a 20-hour free trial so you can test out their service without any money upfront or a long-term commitment. In addition, they promise an impressive 24-hour start-up time, from sign-up to assistance. And if you don’t like their service, you’re protected by their 14-day money back guarantee.

For similar alternatives, you might consider the well-priced business plans from Efficise or My Tasker.

The A to Z Tasks website includes a number of testimonials from satisfied clients. Have you used their service?  We’d love for you to share your experience with A to Z Tasks below.

The post A to Z Tasks appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Wonder is an online personal research assistant service that performs like a search engine, with the added benefit of being human-powered and delivering more detailed answers.

You can ask Wonder a question or request some research to be carried out and you’ll have a nicely written synopsis back within 24 hours.

The company was founded in 2012, their headquarters are in New York, with their team of researchers based all over the world.

About AskWonder

The company is headed up and run by Founder and CEO Justin Wohlstadter, CRO Guy Cohen, Head of New Business Bill Vesce, Head of New Markets Nick Maugeri, Director of Staff Andrew Karp, Director of New Business Bill Germano, and Director of Research Rachel Granby.

Most of their researchers are based in North America, with some spanning across Africa, the UK, Brazil, Japan, and other countries.

The only countries where they cannot accept researchers are countries that do not accept PayPal payments.

Their target customers are, “Anyone from individuals up to Fortune 500s.” So, if you’re too busy, do not have the resources, or are not sure where to start researching an answer — Wonder is will do it for you.

Services

AskWonder.com was developed to be a personal research assistant available for anyone and everyone who is in need of a detailed human answer to a specific question.

You can use the service to answer a question that’s been on your mind, or direct a detailed business question requiring some in-depth research to their team of researchers.

Whatever the question, the researchers at Wonder will do all the work for you and send you a detailed response quoting all the necessary sources to back up their answer.

How it Works

To give you some of the behind-the-scenes details, when you submit a question their system will break it down into smaller pieces if need be.

These are then picked up by different analysts to speed up the entire process. They combine all their information and add multiple points of view and the research is delivered to you in under 24 hours.

Some examples of the kinds of requests Wonder commonly answer are:

• Please provide demographic statistics for residents in a 3 mile radius of [Insert Location].
• How many boxing gyms are there in the US?
• What is the hottest chilli in the world?
• I need information about how the cost of living has changed in New York over the last 20 years.

As you can see from these few examples there are no limits to the types of questions you can ask. If there is an answer and some research to back it up the researchers at AskWonder will find it for you.

Plans and Pricing

There is an undisclosed annual membership fee, and a flat fee of $75 per request.

I reached out to find out what exactly that annual fee is, but based on the big national brands listed as customers, I’m guessing it isn’t small.

A sales representative from Wonder responded almost immediately, but wouldn’t discuss pricing over email, and instead wanted to set up an introductory call to learn more about my company and my research needs.

Wonder Alternatives

Obviously there are some other online resources you can use for free to find answers to your questions, such as search engines like Google or websites like Quora.

You’re not going to get the detailed, personalized answer like the team at AskWonder will give you though, and it can take a long time to sort through all the answers yourself.

But odds are if you’re researching a research service like Wonder, a simple Google search probably isn’t going to turn up the data you’re looking for. In the past, I’ve turned to Fancy Hands and OkayRelax for research tasks, but Wonder seems to really specialize in the in-depth digging that these services would have a harder time with.

Your Turn

Have you requested research from AskWonder? If so, please take a moment to leave a review below to help others with their decision.

The post Wonder appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

BELAY is a virtual staffing solutions company that employs exclusively US-based assistants and specialists. The company got its start in 2010 helping churches and pastors outsource their administrative work, and has since expanded to serve businesses (small & large) nationwide.

About BELAY

In 2017, BELAY brought several different business support companies under one roof and under one brand. The most well-known of those is eaHELP, which you’ll see referenced in many of the reviews below.

The company gets its name from mountain climbing; a belay is a means of supporting a climber so he or she can continue safely without falling. Similarly, they aim to support your proverbial climb as well.

BELAY Founder Interview

Bryan Miles, the founder of BELAY, is focused on delivering superior service to his customers. The strategy seems to be paying off, with business growing rapidly and a host of marquee clients. In fact, the company has earned glowing endorsements from author Michael Hyatt and other Fortune 500 companies.

I had the chance to sit down with Bryan and ask him a few questions on what sets BELAY apart from the competition, who their target customers are, what areas of work they specialize, and who should NOT use their service.

As mentioned in the video, use this link to grab a free copy of The Virtual Assistant Solution (which normally sells on Amazon for $2.99).

With so many changes in our economy and hiring strategies, Bryan argues it may be time to rethink your approach to staffing. In fact, he gives 9 reasons to consider going virtual for your next hire in his free ebook (email opt-in required, but worth the read).

Services

BELAY’s menu of services includes 4 main categories:

1. Virtual Assistants
2. Content Writers
3. Web Maintenance
4. Bookkeeping

Administrative

BELAY executive assistants are highly skilled administrative professionals trained in a variety of support tasks. Their goal is to match you with a virtual assistant who will work cohesively with you and your existing team even though they’ll be working remotely. BELAY strongly believes that every leader thrives with the support of an intentionally matched VA.

Some of the more common jobs BELAY VAs do include scheduling and travel planning, research, preparing presentations, social media admin, project management, and other ongoing business support functions. The idea is to let someone else handle what they’re good at, so you can focus your time on what you’re good at — or what you need to do to grow your business.

The BELAY model is known as a “staff leasing” arrangement. Where other virtual assistant companies may assign your tasks to whoever is available at the moment, BELAY gives you a dedicated/assigned assistant so you can build a one-on-one relationship and gain the efficiencies that come with it.

Bookkeeping

BELAY has extensive experience in bookkeeping for non-profits and churches. These services were previously offered under the MAG Bookkeeping brand.

As a national leader in church and non-profit bookkeeping services, BELAY understand the unique needs and challenges of non-profit and church bookkeeping. BELAY Virtual Bookkeepers possess the knowledge, passion, and expertise necessary to keep your mission moving forward.

BELAY bookkeepers provide:  

• Bank Reconciliation
• Accounts Payable
• Payroll Services
• Cash Flow Management
• Financial Statements and Reporting
• Account Structure
• And more

Website Support and Maintenance

BELAY provide clients with all the critical support needed to keep your WordPress site running smoothly, such as:

• Hosting Support
• Backups
• Domain Management
• Software Updates
• Improving Site Speed
• Hacking Prevention
• And more

The webmasters at BELAY can also create landing pages and do graphic design tasks. They offer unlimited site edits per month, along with expert advice and ongoing analysis of your site. You can work with their webmasters to make all the changes needed to get your site up to a high standard, or build a new site from scratch.

Typically, the clients that engage this service are business owners who have decided it’s time to outsource the maintenance of their site so they can focus their time elsewhere.

Others have outgrown their original website and are struggling to keep up with the maintenance and need to expand.

Content Writing

If you need help with your written content, BELAY can help there as well. Quality content is at the forefront of Internet marketing, and BELAY’s content writers can help you spread the word of your business through site content and marketing.

When I spoke with Ivy Sprague, who heads up this division of BELAY (formerly known as Ellipsis), she explained the service in this way, “We want to be the voice in your head…only better. We’ll write about anything, from accounting to Internet security.”

The company partners with professional writers to create content that will make a difference to your business. Their writers will help spread the voice of your business to a much wider audience. Writing content is a time-consuming process, hiring a writer from BELAY means you can free up time to focus on other areas of your business.

BELAY content writers produce:

• Blog posts
• Social media content
• Lead generation and sales copy
• Email marketing campaigns copy
• Ebooks and White Papers
• and more

The writers are trained to keep the content they provide in your own “voice.” They will call you to discuss your current content strategies, previous writers you may have used, what style of writing you want for your business, and aim to provide you with more than just a quote.

BELAY Review

The company offers monthly service plans and the sign-up process begins with a free consultation and personalized price quote.

A flat monthly fee gives you access to your VA week in and week out, without having to worry about overhead, timesheets, and billing headaches. Modest discounts are available for scaling up the engagement, and you can change plans at any time given reasonable notice.

US VA Company Comparison Chart

Plans and Pricing

As you might expect, BELAY is considerably more expensive than many of the overseas virtual assistant options. In some parts of the world, you may even be able to find a full-time virtual employee for a lower monthly fee. But BELAY believes you get what you pay for, and clearly isn’t targeting the same customer who’s looking for the $5/hour VA.

As of January 2018, their hourly rates range from $36 – $41.

The good thing is that these rates are “all-inclusive,” in that you don’t have any additional employer burden costs to pay on top of it, like you would with a traditional W-2 employee. If you are a non-profit or a church, lower rates may be available.

VAA Exclusive: Mention Virtual Assistant Assistant when you join and get 5 free hours!

BELAY’s agreements are offered as month-to-month contracts with a 30 day cancellation notice, and there are a variety of contract sizes available from each service line.

How it Works

For new clients, BELAY guides them through a proven on-boarding process led by a BELAY Relationship Manager. The Relationship Manager acts as a client’s trusted advisor for:

1. The selection of your new BELAY specialist (your virtual assistant). BELAY uses a multi-step process and a team of people to find the best specialist for what needs to be done and fits the culture of your organization. (When I went through this, it included a full-blown personality screening to make sure my assistant and I were compatible.)  
2. A successful start with a new BELAY specialist. The client’s Relationship Manager guides them through best practices for working with their new, remote BELAY specialist from their vast experiences with clients that span over 30 different industries and all sizes or organizations.

Press and Awards

In 2015, eaHELP was named the 131st fastest growing company in America by Inc. Magazine, earning a spot in the prestigious Inc. 500 list.

BELAY Alternatives

A few other virtual assistant companies operate on a similar model with home-based American assistants, including top-rated firms like Time Etc and Worldwide101. Worldwide101 has similar (though more transparent/flexible) pricing options, and Time Etc is the most affordable of the three.

For the website maintenance and support service, you might consider Zen WP.

For the content creation service, Copywriter Today may be worth a look.

Employee Burden Infographic

Your Turn

Have you worked with BELAY (or eaHELP, Render, Ellipsis, or MAG Bookkeeping)? If so, please consider sharing a short review below to help others with their decision.

The post BELAY (formerly eaHELP) appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Acelerar is a virtual assistant service company based in Noida, India. The company has been in operation since 2010 and provides virtual assistants round the clock to support clients around the world in their respective time zones.

About Acelerar

Acelerar operates out of a hi-tech suburb of New Delhi, Noida, India. The company currently employs 52 members of staff, and when I spoke with them recently they pointed out that they are planning to double this number by the end of 2016.

The company only employs college graduates and they put their virtual assistants through a number of background checks and other tests. Their candidates go through a two-week training course where they cover using MS office, social media tools, and complete dummy projects to develop an understanding of their roles.

Each virtual assistant signs a Nondisclosure Agreement so you don’t need to worry about your confidentiality being breached. When you sign up for a package you are assigned a Customer Success Manager. This member of staff acts as your point of contact to ensure you’re happy with how things are going.

AcelerarTech has implemented a time-tracking tool to keep you in touch with your virtual assistant. This allows you to keep up-to-date with how your tasks are progressing. You can view screenshots of your work being completed and contact your virtual assistant with any feedback you have.

Acelerar Intro Video

Services

When I spoke with Acelerar they summarized their services into the following areas:

• Administration assistance
• Data entry
• Customer service
• List building and lead generation
• Online research
• Recruitment
• Back office support
• Real estate services
• Ad-hoc tasks

Plans and Pricing

Acelerar has four different hourly packages. Their packages start at $160 per month and you can secure a less expensive rate the more hours you purchase. The complete pricing table is as follows:

• 20 hours per month – $160 ($8/hr)
• 40 hours per month – $280 ($7/hr)
• 80 hours per month – $480 ($6/hr)
• 160 hours per month – $800 ($5/hr)

If you’ve been comparing different VA companies, you know these rates are quite competitive.

They also offer a free trial to test their services. You do need to put down a small deposit, but it’s fully refundable if you are not happy with their service for any reason.

Getting started with Acelerar couldn’t be any easier. You can either give them a call, submit a form on their website for a free quote, or use a live chat box on their site for a quick answer to any questions you have.

Acelerar Alternatives

Among other virtual assistant companies in India, MyTasker or Ask Sunday might be worth a look. Their range of services offered are similar though their pricing packages are both slightly more expensive.

Your Turn

Have you worked with Acelerar? If so, please share a quick review of your experience below to help others with their decision.

The post Acelerar appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

MyTasker is a well-established and fast growing firm in the virtual assistant industry. The India-based company was founded in 2012 by three veteran VAs, who brought years of experience to the table.

Since the MyTasker team spent the time in the trenches, they know how to take care of clients and were able to recruit high-performing professional virtual assistants to join their team.

They started out as a contract service on Freelancer.com, and after gaining some traction on that platform decided to launch as a standalone operation.

Services

My Tasker offers a dedicated virtual assistant service starting at 10 hours a month.

This plan, dubbed Professional Assistance, plans target entrepreneurs who need affordable help in their business.

Your dedicated MyTasker VA can handle everything from customer support (online or over the phone), transcription, social media management and online marketing, online research, website maintenance and more.

Naturally, your virtual assistant can handle general administrative tasks as well such as appointment setting, travel or restaurant reservations, or other back-office tasks that can be completed remotely.

In addition to these types of tasks, MyTasker has also added two new specialty divisions for SEO and for a virtual receptionist service. I’ll show you the details and pricing for those services below.

MyTasker Intro Video

How it Works

With My Tasker, you’re assigned a qualified VA based on the anticipated roles you need filled. You can communicate via phone, email, or Skype, and delegate tasks on a recurring or on-demand basis. For each task you delegate, they’ll either tackle it themselves, or request help from a qualified team member.

Your pre-purchased hours expire at the end of each billing cycle, but there are no long-term contracts and you can cancel at any time.

Your VA’s hours are tracked inside MyTasker’s internal dashboard so you can always log in and see how much time you have left for the month.

MyTasker Review

Since then I’ve used their service for some daily database maintenance tasks and found them to be quite reliable. At one point, my VA had moved on to a new role within the company and it was several days before I even found out because she’d taken full responsibility to train her replacement.

Plans and Pricing

The rates for Professional Assistance start at $140 for a 10-hour a month plan, and go all the way down to $7.50/hr for a massive 160-hour plan.

That means you can have a full-time 40-hour a week VA for just $1200, which is a strong value for ongoing business support. If you want to take the service for a test drive, I suggest selecting one of the smaller plans to start with, and then scaling up your engagement from there. (Use the discount code below!)

Pricing Table (accurate at press time):

• 10 hrs per month – $140 ($14/hr)
• 20 hrs per month – $250 ($12.50/hr)
• 40 hrs per month – $450 ($11.25/hr)
• 60 hrs per month – $600 ($10/hr)
• 100 hrs per month – $900 ($9/hr)
• 160 hrs per month – $1200 ($7.50/hr)

If at any time you go over your plan’s hours, additional time can be purchased at $15 an hour (assuming staff availability).

VAA Exclusive: Get 20% off your first month w/ discount code VAA20MT.

Virtual Receptionist Plans

My Tasker added a call answering service where you can have a virtual receptionist answer your business line 24 hours a day. They’ll log and record each call, and give your company a professional presence on the phone.

SEO Packages

And finally, if you need help with SEO and driving more traffic to your site from Google and other search engines, MyTasker has built up a dedicated team of SEO experts.

The service includes on-page optimization and off-page link building, and is ideal for local businesses. You pick the 10 most important pages on your site you want to rank for, and the SEO guys get to work.

Google is notoriously fickle so don’t expect results overnight, but over time you should begin to climb in the rankings.

I asked Ronny, the COO, what sets My Tasker apart from the competition, both in India and elsewhere. He explained that the team’s extensive experience in the industry, especially on the customer service side, gives them an advantage.

“We have the freedom to go that extra mile to make sure our customers are satisfied,” he says, implying that other larger VA companies don’t necessarily afford that freedom.

Your Turn

Have you worked with MyTasker? If so, please share your experience below and help others with their decision.

The post My Tasker (MyTasker) appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

RemSource is an American virtual administrative assistant company based in Baltimore, MD. The company was founded in 2009 by Azi Rosenblum, who saw a need for a more professional, integrated admin service to help growing small businesses.

About RemSource

RemSource offers live administrative support during regular 9-5 office hours, including answering phones and emails, scheduling appointments, and customer service. Their agents can also handle ongoing business process outsourcing and bookkeeping tasks.

RemSource is one of very few US-based virtual assistant companies where the VAs work from an office and not from their homes.

Their team of administrative assistants works from their office in Baltimore (not overseas), and each client is assigned 2 dedicated admins (one primary, one secondary admin). The admins become a part of that business’s team, so the customers get used to speaking with the same people and can develop a long-term relationship.

The service is aimed at small business owners, solo practitioners, financial advisors, consultants, speakers, and other solopreneurs. The company has been recognized in the Baltimore Business Journal and SmartCEO Magazine for their innovative approach to administrative staffing.

RemSource Founder Interview

Services

RemSource is kind of a virtual back-office for your business. They do calendar management and scheduling, Quickbooks bookkeeping, answer your phone, and do proactive follow-ups with prospective leads and customers.

How it works is during your first 3 months as a client, they take a very consultative approach in finding the right opportunities for delegation and streamlining your business processes. Their team works with you to put systems in place for smooth operations and well-defined roles.

I asked Gali, their Director of Business Development, what sets RemSource apart from the competition? Her answer:

“We are one of the very few that offer LIVE 9-5 coverage for our clients. We do not bill by the hour, and we don’t work based on projects, we become essential components of the client’s DAILY operation in order to free up time and help the client focus on growing and building profits.”

That in-office presence that’s “on-call” during business hours is a big selling point. Clients don’t have to stress about counting tasks or running out of hours on their plan.

She also told me a story about how a construction company client of theirs actually won a bid, at least in part because they had a “secretary” answering the phone when the customer called. Little did they know it was really the RemSource VA!

Indeed, she picked up the phone on the first ring when I called.

Another example Gali shared was a busy graphic designer who felt bogged down by scheduling, invoicing, and following-up on proposals. Now RemSource handles all of that and she can focus on the work that only she can do: the talented design work that rings the cash register.

How RemSource Works

Plans and Pricing

Monthly packages start around $500-600 per month, but a more typical engagement is in the $1500 per month range.

Virtual Assistant Assistant Exclusive: Mention you found RemSource on VAA to save $100 on your first month of administrative services and/or $50 off your first month of bookkeeping services.

Where they used to put new clients on a 14-day trial plan, they found that didn’t serve the needs of either party very well. It was hard for RemSource to get fully integrated into a business and run at peak efficiency in that time frame, and it was also difficult to fully understand the scope of the client’s business and make process/delegation suggestions.

As a result, they’ve switched over to a quarterly engagement plan, in which both RemSource and their clients can take a longer-term view at their respective roles, responsibilities, and opportunities. These quarterly agreements are customized on a client-by-client basis, and are typically billed monthly.

RemSource Alternatives

As I mentioned, the virtual-but-still in-office admin model is rare for a company this size. (Most competitors run a model with home-based staff.) In the US, two similar services come to mind: Longer Days in Michigan, and Virtual Assist USA in Pennsylvania.

Both of those options operate on kind of a hybrid model with hourly packages and access to a team of assistants for various business needs.

The RemSource service is what I’d consider a step up from just virtual receptionist services or UAssist.ME‘s low-level plan that promises a similar “all-day” coverage but shared among several clients.

Your Turn

Have you worked with RemSource? If so, please take a minute to leave a quick review below to help others with their decision.

The post RemSource appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.

Task Virtual is an India-based virtual assistant company. The company is relatively new to the virtual assistant space, although the company is headed up by two partners with a considerable amount of experience in the industry.

The company offers a wide range of services, carried out by fully-vetted, skilled assistants, and being based in India they are able to offer competitive rates.

About TaskVirtual

When I asked Task Virtual about their company directive they said, “we are committed, on time, dedicated, and shoulder all the responsibilities of our clients.” With speed and accuracy being two of the more important reasons to start outsourcing, it’s reassuring to hear this directly from a company.

Their target customers are business owners and entrepreneurs in need of additional support without employing their own staff. TaskVirtual’s staff are available to start work at short notice without any long-term contracts.

When you sign up with TaskVirtual.com you purchase a number of tasks or an amount of hours. When you send over details of the tasks you want completed they find an assistant with the best-matched skillset to carry out the work. This means you have access to a large pool of assistants to take advantage of different skills, as opposed to being tied to the same assistant as offered by some companies. You do however have the option of a dedicated assistant should you prefer to work with the same person.

All their virtual assistants are managed in-house by line-managers and they will also accommodate your working hours and timezone. On paper, Task Virtual tick all the right boxes and they appear to have plenty of flexibility. To find out exactly how they match up with your own requirements you will need to contact them with as much information as you can provide to gauge their response.

Services

Task Virtual’s virtual assistants provide support for a wide range of tasks, including:

• Admin support
• Social media management
• Content writing
• Research
• Data entry
• Email and calendar management
• IT support
• And more

The company list their own areas of specialization as real estate management, eCommerce management, and social media management.

They offer custom quotes for large jobs if you have an ongoing project you want help with. As always, when communicating with virtual assistant companies you are going to have a better relationship the more detail you can provide. Be as detailed as possible and give plenty of feedback to your assistant.

Plans and Pricing

Task Virtual offer packages for two different types of services; Personal Assistance Services, and Business Assistance Services.

There are three different plans within their Personal Assistance Services. The packages are priced in task bundles, with tasks being classified as 10-15 minute jobs each;

• 20 tasks – $39 per month ($1.95 per task)
• 50 tasks – $50 per month ($1.58 per task)
• 100 tasks – $139 per month ($1.39 per task)

Their Business Assistance Services are priced in hours. Their packages are as follows:

• 5 hours per month – $60 ($12 per/hr)
• 10 hours per month – $110 ($11 per/hr)
• 20 hours per month – $200 ($10 per/hr)
• 40 hours per month – $360 ($9 per/hr)
• 60 hours per month – $480 ($8 per/hr)
• 100 hours per month – $700 ($7 per/hr)

Virtual Assistant Assistant Exclusive: Mention referral code VAA20 for 20% off your first month of service! (Not valid on Personal Assistance plans.)

There are also some larger bundles of hours available, including a full-time assistance plan for $899 ($5.62 an hour) and your assistant will work 5 days a week during whatever business hours you choose. That’s quite a competitive rate for full-time support.

TaskVirtual also has a Pay As You Go plan priced at $13 an hour with no commitment, no minimums, and no limits on how many hours you use.

New customers can take advantage of their 3-hour free trial to sample their services before signing up for a plan.

Special Offer for VAA Visitors:

Virtual Assistant Assistant Exclusive: I’ll do you one even better than the banner above. Mention referral code VAA20 for 20% off your first month of service! (Not valid on Personal Assistance plans.)

TaskVirtual Alternatives

On the personal / task-based side of things, your primary competitors are OkayRelax, which has plans ranging from $2.50 to $4 per task, but allows tasks up to 30 minutes (vs. 15 at TaskVirtual). OkayRelax also provides a dedicated assistant on their higher tier plans, which may or may not be appealing to you.

The other company I did a trial with a few years ago that might be worth checking out is Efficise, which runs a similar task-based model out of Pakistan.

On the business assistance side, I’d take a look at MyTasker or TaskBullet, and reach out to start a conversation and see which might be the best fit for your specific needs.

Your Turn

Have you worked with Task Virtual? If so, please leave a review of your experience below to help others with their decision.

The post TaskVirtual appeared first on Virtual Assistant Reviews.