Outsourcing Tips For Your Online Business
What services can you outsource?
Which should you do yourself?
There is no rule that says you have to do one thing or the next when it comes to handling your business. It is always best that you work toward growing your business and interacting with present clients yourself, though. This shows that you are serious about what is happening within your business and it ensures that the client knows who to come to when there is a problem.
Ask yourself this: how much are you working “on” the business versus “in” the business?
Follow these tips to begin a new era for your business…
The following are some of the services you may want to consider outsourcing.
- Image by Silicon Gulf via Flickr
- Web design and blog design: If you do not have these skills to start out with, there is no problem. Team up with another company who lacks what you have – and needs social media marketing expertise, for example. You can simply contact any small web design firm to create this type of relationship. Make an offer they cannot refuse. Think about how you can help them first.
- Blog writing: Writing services in general can be outsourced to qualified writers. Make sure they are qualified and ask for references and samples. Expect to pay them a decent wage, but in general, it is far less than what you will be paid in return for that post. If you do not like to write or have no experience in it, you can outsource this skill from the start. Try www.elance.com, for example.
- Email marketing: You can outsource the creation of an email marketing list building, content – and ongoing maintenance of that list. You can hire someone to set up the templates, and write the content of the emails for you. If you are doing auto-responder type emails, make sure you don’t spam your list – space the content out over time.
- Link building: There are companies that are dedicated to providing this service. However, it is never a good idea to work with companies offering link farms, which are organizations that grab thousands of links and switch them with each other. Other sites have lists of links on them. These are not companies to work with since Google and other search engines will penalize you for this type of activity. Use a white-hat, organic, merit-based, measured link building approach. Perhaps you can even create a “badge” for your company that others can use on their site.
- Twitter and social media: If you are not the type of person that likes to chat or converse on the web with others through Twitter, you can outsource this task, too. Be sure that the people you hire to do the work are able to provide you with the same level of skill that you would provide to the company. Track the twitter followers, replies and Re-tweets.
- Billing and administration: If you do not like to keep the books or do not want to handle the overall administration tasks for your business, you can hire a company or a virtual assistant to do this work for you. Quickbooks is recommended, and you can give access only to the tasks you need done. Paypal is even simpler, and you have different access levels there as well.
There are many ways that you can outsource the tasks you need to do on any one day. But, should you?
- Image via Wikipedia
Be up front and honest with those who you are working with. Let the small business owners know that you are working with a group of people, your team, and you oversee the services they provide. You generally do not have to explain this unless the company wants to know the specifics of how your business works. Do not lie about the services you are providing. You can build a strong virtual team to stand by you. The customers will love you for it.
Business expansion and growth potential.
In addition to this, also keep in mind that you can increase your business incredibly by using outsourcing. In short, you could spend the ten minutes it takes to research, write and send out that Tweet, or you can instead just have someone else do that while you work on a key blog post, or on the phone helping a customer, or greeting new ones at a networking event. You can get more done when you outsource some of the lesser important tasks.
Keep in mind that one of the key benefits of this business is the fact that is allows you to earn residual income. That means that you will earn this income month after month, as long as you keep providing the services to the businesses. That offers a safety net that anyone can appreciate. However, in order to keep the safety net, you need to deliver to your clients.
What typical tasks do you outsource, and how do you do it?
P.S.
Fellow entrepreneur John Jonas has a program you should check out. Lots of good info there and he’s cool too.
Related articles
- The hidden dangers of outsourcing (blogs.forbes.com)
- “Honestly, history tells us the act of outsourcing doesn’t save money…” Gartner Group (enterpriseirregulars.com)
- Top Ten Management on Outsourcing: An Overview of Paying Someone to Do a Job Cheaper – and Maybe Better (bizcovering.com)
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Entrepreneur Magazine says Jon Rognerud is one of the most sought-after Digital Marketing Experts. His clients extend from high-end brands and middle-tier businesses in both B2B and B2C. His SEO website optimization book, "The Ultimate Guide to Optimizing Your Website" from Entrepreneur Press is in bookstores now.