What Does a Technical Virtual Assistant Actually Do?

What the role means

A technical virtual assistant handles the CRM, automations, tool connections, web maintenance, reporting, and written processes behind your business. A general virtual assistant handles the people layer: inbox, scheduling, admin, and light coordination. Most growing businesses need both. If you want the service-page version, see CRM and automation specialist.

What a technical virtual assistant does in a typical week

• ●Cleans up the CRM. Dedupes contacts, fixes broken tags, archives dead leads, and sets up a regular cleanup schedule.
• ●Builds and monitors automations. Zapier flows, Make scenarios, native CRM campaigns. Fixes them when they break.
• ●Wires integrations between tools. Stripe to CRM, CRM to LMS, scheduling to calendar, forms to spreadsheets.
• ●Handles web maintenance. Plugin updates, page edits, contact form fixes, light SEO patches.
• ●Builds reports. Pulls numbers from three platforms into a weekly or monthly dashboard so the founder does not have to.
• ●Documents the work. Writes clear instructions so the next hire can follow the process instead of asking the founder how it works.

What a technical virtual assistant does NOT do

• ●Bespoke software development. If you need a React app or a custom plugin built, that is a developer.
• ●Original copywriting or brand strategy. A technical virtual assistant edits and ships, not invents.
• ●Paid media management or ad account ownership. Different specialty.
• ●Bookkeeping, payroll, or tax. Same problem, different specialty.
• ●Substantive legal, financial, or medical work. Always a licensed professional.

Technical virtual assistant vs general virtual assistant: when each one fits

Most growing businesses eventually need both sides of the role. The order depends on where the slowdown actually is.

• ●Hire a general virtual assistant first if: your inbox is the main problem, scheduling is chaotic, and you are losing hours to admin.
• ●Hire a technical virtual assistant first if: your CRM is broken, your automations are failing with no alert, integrations between tools are duct-taped, and you cannot trust the numbers.
• ●Hire both (or one technical virtual assistant who covers both) if: you are past $500K in revenue and the systems layer and the people layer are both leaking time.

What it costs in 2026

• ●General virtual assistants (offshore): $8 to $15 per hour.
• ●General virtual assistants (North America): $25 to $45 per hour.
• ●Technical virtual assistants (specialists): $35 to $80 per hour, with monthly retainers commonly $1,400 to $6,400 in CAD.
• ●Part-time operations or systems specialists: $100 to $200 per hour for project-only work.
• ●A senior technical virtual assistant on a 40-hour starter retainer is roughly 25% the cost of an in-house ops manager, with none of the payroll, equipment, or benefits overhead.

How to know it is time to hire one

The direct signal is when you can answer 'yes' to two or more of these:

• ●Your CRM has more than 1,500 contacts and you don't trust the data.
• ●You are running 3+ tools that talk to each other through Zapier and at least one of those Zaps has broken in the last quarter.
• ●You manually pull the same numbers from the same dashboards every week.
• ●You have at least one process that lives only in your head and 'we should document this' has been on the list for 6 months.
• ●Your website maintenance happens at 9pm because nobody else handles it.

How to vet a technical virtual assistant before hiring

• ●Ask them to walk you through a CRM cleanup they did. Specific numbers, specific tools.
• ●Ask which tools they will refuse to work in (a good answer means they have real opinions).
• ●Ask how they handle errors in automations. The answer 'I get an email and fix it' is the wrong one. The right answer mentions logging, retries, and a recovery plan.
• ●Ask for one example of work they would NOT take on. Generalists who promise everything tend to overpromise.
• ●Skip the resume. Ask for a 30 minute audit of your actual CRM or tool setup. The audit tells you everything.