A recent survey of 350 virtual assistants determined the following:

• Most virtual assistants are women (98.2 percent of participants)
• 81 percent are located in the U.S., predominantly in California, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, and most international VAs are in Canada and Australia.
• The largest number of VA participants began their businesses in 2003.
• Most operate as sole proprietorships as home-based businesses.
• 86.7 percent have an active Website.
• Annual gross revenue was $26,519 in 2003, ranging from $760 to $280,000. With the top and bottom 10 percent removed, top income dropped to $52,000 and the average income was $19,800.
• Partitioning part-time and full-time VAs yielded widely differing results in income, with part-time VAs averaging $13,813 and full-time VAs averaging $38,759.
• VAs expect to gross 28.5 percent more in 2004 than they did in 2003, with part-time VAs expecting to earn and average $17,678, and full-time VAs expecting to earn$41,834.
• VAs participants support between one and 116 clients each month, with an average of 6.6 clients per VA. Removing the outliers - top and bottom ten percent - drops that number to 4.7 clients per month.
• VAs work an average of 5.4 days a week, with an median of 40 hours per week worked. However, it was found that part time VAs work about 20 hours per week, while full-time VAs average about 47 hours per week.

The full survey is available for purchase here.
Source link for information used in this post.
Image source.

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Well now that's very interesting. Thanks for posting Tess.

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Shari Sultana
Online Business Manager (marketing for retail ecommerce)

This is way interesting!! Food for thought

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Winslow Girl Virtual Assistant
www.winslowgirlva.com
Taking Virtual Assistance to the Next Level

I thought it was interesting to see a quick and easy graph like that - it really does show you how far and wide we are spread in terms of fees but I find it equally interesting (perhaps not surprising) that the majority of VAs are women...

Also, gives an interesting (and realistic) perspective on just how much TIME and effort goes into a practice!
SO many people take this up because they think it's like four hours a day typing on their computer and they're going to 'make it' but it's much more than that and this study brought light to that fact.

Point in case: we work hard!!

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Definitely interesting.

Thank you for that information. As a disabled worker I work with support form my states Vocational Rehabilitation Department and they are always asking for more information on virtual assisting statistics!

John Runer

Robert is actually updating this survey as there are a large number of VAs in Australia and other areas that did not get to participate. I'm sure you'll hear of the available update.

Kathie M. Thomas

A member was just asking about industry averages, so I thought I'd bump this up for anyone who's not yet seen it

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Thanks, Tess, I enjoyed looking at this. Makes me think of a nagging question I've had: is there a difference between Virtual Assistants and outsourcing? If so, what is the difference exactly?

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Mary H. Ruth/Virtual Writing & Communications
http://www.writingVA.com

Well, to my understanding: anyone who sends work outside of their own company is essentially outsourcing, so any client who works with you is outsourcing. Any process or service you subcontract out to have done is outsourcing.

Offshoring is when you go outside the country to outsource the work you need to have done.

I hope that helps clarify!

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