Administrative Service Business Plan

Everywhere Assistant is a new start up virtual assistant business.  The company is a sole proprietorship with Sadie Clark as the founder and sole employee.  The company was formed and will serve a diverse geographic customer segment.

The Market
Everywhere Assistant has identified three distinct market segments which will be targeted.  The first segment is companies of various sizes.  In the current business climate, there has been a common occurrence to have wide scale corporate downsizing.  This is helpful for Everywhere Assistant because the downsizing means that people kept within the company are busier than ever.  Typical in a downsizing climate there is the outsourcing of projects/jobs that the current staff cannot handle.  Everywhere Assistant believes that the majority of their sales (relative to the other customer segments) will come from the companies.

The second customer segment is individuals.  This is an attractive segment because as our daily lives become busier and busier we have less and less free time.  Using a virtual assistant (VA) is one way to create more free time, or at least not have to do tasks that we may not prefer to.  It is anticipated that the services provided to individuals will be more menial relative to the services provided to companies.

The last customer segment is not for profit organizations. These organizations, in large part due to their status as a not for profit do not have excess capital.  As a consequence, they have tried to maximize employee’s tasks and responsibilities as much as possible.  This means most employees are quite busy.  When a random tasks comes up the organization typically does not have an employee that can just take handle the task.  This is good for VA’s who can quickly and seamlessly take over tasks.  This saves the company money because they are only paying for the labor needed to complete the task.

Services
Everywhere Assistant offers a wide range of services.  The bulk of the services are administrative in nature, whether data entry, mailing list updates, etc.  These will be the services that will be billed out at the lower end of the billing spectrum of $25-$45.  Services that are billed out near the top of the range are those that require higher levels of skills such as accounting, marketing, and graphic design.   In the middle will be services such as concierge services and travel arrangements which are in themselves a wide range of services.  The offered services will be things that the customer does not have time for or things that they choose not to do, something they would prefer someone else to take care.

Competitive Edge
The majority of VA services are secretarial in nature.  They are jobs that an administrative assistant can handle.  Everywhere Assistant will be using their competitive edge of a wide range of skills to their fullest.  In addition to the more menial tasks, Everywhere Assistant is able to offer clients a wide range of more technical skills such as a proficiency with QuickBooks Pro for accounting issues, graphic design with skill in both Photoshop and PageMaker, and well-honed marketing and research skills.  This is a competitive edge because once a client has found a VA they have an economic incentive to continue to use them as opposed to finding someone else (assuming that they are happy with the level of service and the work product).  The problem occurs when the client is happy with the VA but needs work on a project that the VA does not have skills in, consequently, the client must look elsewhere.  An advantage is created when the VA (Everywhere Assistant) has a wider and more complex range of skills, they are then able to offer more value to the client.

Everywhere Assistant is an exciting application of the virtual assistant business model, providing a wide range of customer services from a remote location, leveraging the power of the Internet.  This is a very efficient business model and will provide Sadie with reasonable income and the flexibility to handle the jobs when and how she chooses.  The sales forecast indicates revenue will rise for year two and year three along with corresponding net profit increases.

1.1 Keys to Success

• Offer a wide range of services allowing Everywhere Assistant to handle any type of task.
• Maintain a flexible enough schedule so last minute projects can be completed.
• Ensure accurate billing and project estimates.

1.2 Mission

Everywhere Assistant’s mission is to offer the highest level of administrative assistant services from a remote location.  Everywhere Assistant will be able to handle a wide range of tasks with a level of professionalism and trust that is hard to come by in today’s world.  Everywhere Assistant will exceed customer’s expectations.

1.3 Objectives

• To generate over $35,000 in the first year.
• To develop enough income to make the job full time position.
• To be able to decrease the marketing expenses after couple of years because there is sufficient word of mouth projects to remain busy.