I dug out the phone book to see if I could find any other Virtual Assistants already operating in my city.

I couldn’t find an actual listing for ‘virtual’ or ‘online’ assistants, so I checked out ‘Secretarial Services’ and came across a large number of listings under this section.

Initially, I thought there might not be much point setting up my own Virtual Assistant business, what with all this competition around, however I am starting to realise there is more than enough work and enough clients to go around.

After doing a bit more research, I also discovered that there aren’t very many actual virtual assistants in New Zealand.  In fact many New Zealanders wouldn’t know what a Virtual Assistant does.

I once read somewhere that “Virtual Assistance will be one of the top technological breakthroughs to occur in the world by 2010 and that VA’s will be a widely accepted means of business support.”  Interesting.

Each Virtual Assistant has their own unique set of services on offer, depending on their experience, skill set and background.  The best thing is that fellow VA’s are just part of one big team and not competitors at all. 

They are all ready and able to help each other out if things start to get too busy.  It is an industry full of friendly, courteous people who are generous with their time and knowledge, all of whom are familiar with working in the corporate world.

A Virtual Assistant’s clients can come from anywhere – networking at local business meetings, word of mouth referrals from existing clients, via friends and family, or from ex work colleagues.

A client can be an individual, small business owner or someone who is part of a large organisation.  They can be located anywhere in New Zealand, or the world for that matter, as long as they have access to a computer.

In fact, a Virtual Assistant can quite easily work during the day for a client who is, say, located somewhere in the UK, while that client is sleeping. 

This means that productivity for that client increases because they are not sitting around waiting for work to be done.  Any work is completed and ready for them when they wake up in the morning!  How cool is that?!

With the large number of cottage industries in New Zealand, having access to a Virtual Assistant makes perfect sense. 

No longer do small business owners need to sit in their offices feeling overwhelmed by all this stuff they have to do, wishing they could offload it to someone they trust, but not knowing who to turn to.

The Virtual Assistant industry is growing fast and it’s an industry that can’t be ignored.  So, don’t be nervous – give My Virtual Assistant a call today!