I've spent a good deal of time over the last year hunting for good VAs. Here's what I've learned. 1. Hire three of four to start. Give each of them a chunk of

I've spent a good deal of time over the last year hunting for good VAs. Here's what I've learned. 1. Hire three of four to start. Give each of them a chunk of the same job (if it's research) and see who does best. Then use that person to either finish the project, or give them a couple of new tasks and see how they do on those. 2. Don't go for the cheapest out there. Earlier today I was hiring someone for a research position and I literally had multiple people bidding $0.50/hr. You don't want them. I usually try to stick with people in the $4.00-$8.00 range. I can't really afford more than that, and anyone I have ever hired for less than $4.00 has not worked out at all. 3. ODesk has a lot of people to choose from. There are quite a few outsourcing services out there, and I have used a few to find people with different skill sets. IMO for simple VA tasks odesk is a great place to find people. 4. Individuals are better than firms. Obviously there are benefits to both, but I have tried two Indian firms in the last year and both were a complete waste of time. Basically there were so many people in the chain between me and the people doing the actual tasks that what I asked for and what I got were quite different things. I have had three different filpinos work for me, and have been really pleased by the results I've gotten.