- US median pay$47,540 a year[2]All industries, BLS May 2025
- One-time fee$2,500–3,000[1]On the start day, only if you hire
- Free replacementWithin 180 days[1]One per placement, fee paid, role, hours and pay unchanged, no refund
What the week looks like at an e-commerce brand
A small brand's week follows the shipping cut-off. Monday's inbox carries the weekend's where-is-my-order messages and returns. Orders go out every day, and a stock problem or a carrier delay can turn into hundreds of tickets overnight. Listings, photos and campaigns need updating for each new product, while the founder watches ad spend and margins. Payouts, fees and refunds make the numbers harder to read than they look.
What a virtual assistant does for e-commerce brands
- Handle routine supplier and partner emails from templates
- Build and maintain influencer or wholesale outreach lists
- Collect product reviews and flag those needing a reply
- Pull a weekly sheet of sales, stock and open problems
A virtual assistant, in job-title terms an administrative assistant working remotely, handles the repeating office work of a team: documents, data updates, scheduling, simple customer emails and research. It is broader and less senior than an executive assistant, and it works best with written procedures.
Tools e-commerce brands commonly use
- Shopify
- WooCommerce
- Gorgias
- Zendesk
- Klaviyo
- Amazon Seller Central
- Canva
- QuickBooks
- Xero
- Slack
- Google Workspace
Common in this kind of business, not a checklist: name your own stack in the brief.
How to test a candidate for an e-commerce brand
Ask for a list of ten possible partners in your niche, with a reason for each and a contact route, plus a short pitch email. Check the list for real fit rather than copied directories, and the email for tone.
What to keep in-house or check first
Keep refund limits, supplier contracts, and ad accounts' payment methods with the founder at first. Customer data needs care: limit who can export lists, and if you sell into Europe, check GDPR duties on access from outside the EU. Consumer and product claims rules apply to what gets written on your pages, so someone responsible should approve claims.
General caution, not legal advice: check the rules that apply to you with a qualified adviser.
Available now
1 virtual assistant on Stafka, English B1, updated 5 November 2026. The count is for the role, not for e-commerce brands: name your business in the brief.
Administrative Assistant0 years of experience · AM-1007
- English B1
- $800–1,000 a month
Anonymous profiles of people who asked to be shown to employers. Most applied through our Telegram bot with a written and a voice English task; Silkstaff checks English on a live call before any client interview. Names, contacts and employers stay hidden until a candidate accepts your intro request.
Choose a country: shared hours
Repeating admin work can run on a written checklist with a daily check-in, so a partial overlap with your day usually works. Anything phone-based needs agreed hours.
Against a 9–17 client day in winter[3][4][5][6]; for New York, on a 9–18 local day or a 13–22 shift. Check your own office.
What it costs
We do not publish a pay band for virtual assistants yet: where a profile lists a monthly rate, that is what the person asks for. The BLS figure of $47,540 a year is for Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive[2] across all industries: we have no separate figure for this niche. Paying through Deel adds $49 a month[7]; Wise and Payoneer also work.
See also: virtual assistant pay in the US, by state · pricing and replacement terms.
How hiring through Stafka works
- Send the brief or post the job free. List the recurring tasks, how often each one happens, and the person who will answer questions in the first month.
- Within 5 business days of a confirmed brief you get 3 matching profiles, or a plain no. Most apply through our Telegram bot with a written and a voice English task; each profile shows the English level (B1–C2); Silkstaff checks English on a live call before any client interview.
- You interview, choose and contract the person directly through Deel, Wise or Payoneer. Candidates never pay.
Questions
Should my first e-commerce hire be a VA or a support specialist?
If tickets take most of your time, hire support. If the pressure comes from many small jobs in different places, a VA is the better first step. Look at your last two weeks, and count the hours in each.
How much store access should a remote hire get?
Create a staff account with only the sections they need: orders and customers for support, products for listings. Block exports, payout settings and app installs at first, and remove access the day someone leaves. Check your GDPR duties if you serve EU customers. This is general information, not legal advice.
Where can an e-commerce brand hire an affordable virtual assistant?
The usual routes are a freelance marketplace, an agency with a monthly margin, or a direct hire in a lower-cost country. On Stafka it is a direct hire: you pay the person the monthly pay you agree with them, plus $2,500–3,000[1] once if you hire, with no monthly margin.
General information for small employers, not legal or tax advice: check contracts, tax and data rules for your country with a qualified adviser. Tool names belong to their owners; we are not affiliated with them. Spotted a mistake? Write to hello@silkstaff.com.