Five Benefits Of Outsourcing

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. Depending on the type of business you’re running, you may need to consider outsourcing in order to maximize your productivity. The following contributed post is entitled, Five Benefits Of Outsourcing.

* * *

More and more businesses are learning to strike a balance between quality and cost without compromising on the way to their business runs. It is a mess to think that your business is going to be a success just because you’re putting in your all – it’s not just about you! In fact, your business is only going to be a success if you hire the right people to help.

Sure, you may start out by yourself, but you’re likely not going to be the one hosting the VPS that you put in place. You’re also not likely to be the one doing your taxes at the end of the financial year. Being able to have the right people on your team will keep your business secure, it will keep you sane, and it will stop you from burning out as a business leader. Most businesses will benefit from reducing their costs, and one of the best ways to do that is with the help of outsourced experts. Below, we have five top benefits of outsourcing in your business.

Image Source: Pexels

1. You’re going to improve your efficiency. Improving efficiency is so important in your business and outsourcing enables you to do that. You can hire an expert who may not necessarily be available in your area – allowing you to cast a wider net for talent. In a candidate lead market, which is what we are experiencing right now, finding the right talent is harder than ever. When you outsource, you’re going to find someone who knows what they’re doing and you have a global reach to do it.

2. You will reduce your costs. One of the biggest driving forces behind companies who prefer to outsource rather than hiring in-house teams is money. If you are a business leader you would’ve seen over the pandemic the money that you have saved by not having a whole team of people in your office. In fact, you may find that your office space is going to benefit from outsourced workers rather than in-house ones because you don’t even have to have sign fice at all! Cost reduction in areas of renting and utilities will mean that you can spend that money elsewhere to expand your business in the best way.

3. You have the chance to expand your business. When you outsource, your company is able to expand business operations overseas. Outsourcing doesn’t have to be a local thing, which means that you can access better things abroad and your goals for business expansion can be achieved effortlessly and lower costs. There should be a dream that comes to your business, especially if you are looking into global domination as your dream goal.

4. You can offer a comfortable work environment. Your team who are currently at work but at home are going to be able to get a much more comfortable working environment because of outsourcing. Remote work is beneficial to many employees, as they can work and stay close to the left ones at the same time. You’re also going to be a much more popular employer if the pack that you can offer.

5. Increasing productivity. Lastly, as your team is no longer going to be bombarded with huge responsibilities, they are going to work better and smarter on the tasks that they do have.

Should Your Small Business Look To Outsource?

Two focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. While a business may be started with specific products and services in mind, seldom is it equipped to have everything it needs to complete its mission, hence the need for outsourcing. The following contributed post is entitled, Should Your Small Business Look To Outsource?

* * *

When it comes to setting up a business and ensuring success, then there will be a time when hiring really is critical. Even if you start small, as a one-person operation, hiring is inevitable. To do well in business, you need to have teams that are going to help and support. The whole hiring process, no matter if you choose full-time or part-time employees is really important, as you want to have the right person for the job.

Although the process is important, it is not something that is easy. If you want to expand and grow what you do, then you will need to have more and more people on-board. Of course, this can help to grow the business, but it also means more costs for wages, as well as additional things like insurance for employees and sick pay, and so on. As this is a consideration, you could also look to hire people to do work for you that are not part of an in-house team. When you outsource to a company or an individual, you just pay for the task that is required, and there is no more commitment. If they do a good job, then you know who to use again. If they don’t, then you know to not hire them again, making it much simpler in many ways than having a full-time employee.

If your business has not thought about outsourcing before, then here are some of the things that you could outsource for, and when you should outsource. Getting it right will help to save the business money in the long-term, as well as help to keep the business thriving.

image

Tasks where you lack expertise

Businesses can vary so much, and as a small business owner, you might not have any previous experience in this area. So there may be some aspects of business that you have no idea about. Areas like social media are a good idea for small business, especially from a digital marketing point of view. However, if you have a small team, then you’re likely to not have the time or expertise to run it successfully, as an example. In the same way, you will need bookkeeping and accounts for your business, but if no one is experienced in this, then outsourcing this will help massively, and be something that you no longer need to think about. If you hired a full-time accountant to do this for you, there wouldn’t be enough work to fill a full-time role, and it would cost a lot more than using a separate company or person to do this for you.

Time consuming tasks

Likewise, outsourcing tasks to someone else can be a good idea, especially for any tasks that are time consuming. There are a number of tasks in business that can take up a lot of time, but that aren’t too taxing or vital to business, they just need to be done. Your expertise should be doing the tasks that are the things helping to grow the business, rather than the smaller and more time consuming tasks. For example, you might take a lot of phone orders or customer service calls. These calls could be taken by a business answering service, rather than paying for a full-time employee to do it all. There are a range of tasks, and it will vary from business to business, but it is worth looking into if you are hoping to propel your business forward.

If you are deciding whether or not to outsource or to hire someone to your team, then there are a number of things to think about. It starts by taking a look at your business needs, as there are a number of advantages to both options, as well as disadvantages of both options. It is important to not get too caught up in the different activities that could happen, and which of those you should or shouldn’t hire or outsource too. You could have some expertise in a particular area, such as accounting, for example. But if you take on a lot of other roles, being the accountant as well might be too much. So even if you have a team of people with experience in something in particular, you might still choose to outsource.

Look at your business and the people in it specifically. Look at the needs and then decide what areas will be a benefit to you if you outsource, or which really do need to have an in-house team member. Assess the tasks, weigh up the costs, and your options, and then go from there.

Which Areas Should Your SMB Outsource?

Two of the focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. The decision to start outsourcing is a critical strategic move for any business. Successfully outsourcing can propel your business to the next level if it is done correctly. The following contributed post is entitled, Which Areas Should Your SMB Outsource?

* * *

image

Outsourcing is something that many startups don’t consider for themselves. They wrongly believe that it’s something that comes much later down the line, that it’s something that only much larger companies and corporations can benefit from. Outsourcing is where you hire a third party to tackle a designated area of your business. It could be a one- off job or it could be ongoing such as managing an entire department. It’s something that any company can utilise, but is especially ideal when first starting out, as instead of spending money on larger premises, more equipment, hiring and training staff and more, you can pay a company to tackle that area.

Manufacturing
This is something that most smaller and medium sized businesses choose to outsource, and for good reason. Manufacturing yourself requires a lot of money and materials upfront to get started, from steel watertanks to machinery, power tools, vehicles- not to mention warehousing space and qualified staff to run everything. Outsourcing your manufacturing is usually the best option until you’re a much larger company.

IT
Your website, social media and all elements of your business online are some of the most important. When you outsource your IT department you can be sure you’ll never be left with a website that’s not loading properly, or issues online that could be costing you money. Research shows that online customers are impatient, if someone clicks on your site and it doesn’t work they’ll click off within three seconds and may never return.

Blog Writing
Blogging is great for business, it makes your site look professional and helps you to gain followers and more interest in what you sell. However, writing high quality content on a regular basis is time consuming. Outsourcing the work for freelance bloggers means your blog will stay updated, and you won’t have to find the time or man power within your own team to do this.

Video Editing
Along with a well written blog, high quality videos on your website or on a Youtube channel for your business can help you with your success. These videos can go viral and be used as promotion, or they can be instructional guides if what you do or sell requires this. They could involve a landing page video which introduces and talks about your business giving more information. But they need to be done well, outsource to a video production or editing company for the best effect.

Human Resources
There are many legal considerations when it comes to human resources, as this department deals with things like bullying in the workplace, employee theft, hiring, firing and other very important issues. When you work with a specialist HR company you can be sure that everything will be handled fairly as they will be well versed in the ever changing law.

You can outsource just about any area of business these days. Not only does it save you money, but it can give you peace of mind too, as when you hire a professional company, you know that they’re professionals in their area and you can trust them to do a good job.

Where And When To Outsource Your Solutions

Two key focuses of my blog are Financial Literacy/Money and Business/Entrepreneurship. When running any business, it’s important to know what tasks you can effectively perform on your own, and when the need arises to outsource those tasks. The following contributed post is thus entitled; Where And When To Outsource Your Solutions.

* * *

Outsourcing provides you with the option of giving some of the work that your business is responsible for to a third-party company. There are companies that can help you outsource all kinds of work, but it’s an option that needs to be used responsibly. It can help get rid of monotonous tasks and implement expert knowledge in the business but if it’s overused, it can cost a lot more than simply hiring someone. Here, we’re going to look at when it’s a good idea to outsource and some of the risks of doing it poorly.

Photo by rawpixel

When you’re not ready for full-time employees
A common reason to outsource is that you have more work and duties than your current team can handle. Why wouldn’t you simply take on some employees? The biggest reason to go with outsourcing instead is that there isn’t quite enough suitable work to justify a full-time role in the business. In that case, the process of recruiting and training an employee so that they can spend most of their time doing nothing can be much less cost-effective than simply relying on a service that you can call on whenever you need it. Outsourcing is scalable to your needs, but a full-time employee might not have that flexibility.

When it makes your business more efficient
There are services that can help you work on the business from a bird’s eye perspective, creating the structure and tools that allows your team to become a lot more productive and efficient. Many business consultants do exactly that, helping business owners strategize certain teams, processes, and systems that the rest of the team uses. The most common form in today’s tech-fueled environment is IT consulting for businesses. You might not necessarily need a full internal IT team if your business isn’t big enough, but consultants can make sure that you have the right tech systems in place, as well as providing repair and maintenance when it’s needed.

When you need real expert insight
There are a lot of tasks you might not need to do quite as often, but when you do, you really need expert input on how to do it right. For instance, there is a lot you and your team can learn to handle in marketing, from content marketing to social media networking. When it comes to website design, however, you need someone with specific experience and expertise in that field. When it comes to parts of the business that have legal implications, it’s best not to go it alone, too. For instance, hiring a business accountant when the tax season rolls around, and you want to avoid getting audited as best as you possibly can. Outsourcing allows you to temporarily tap into a much broader network of expertise that you might not necessarily need on your team, but you definitely need on your side.

Outsourcing can really help you unlock the productivity of your team and benefit from reals experts that you might not have room for on your internal team. Make sure that you’re following the tips above to outsource in a way that promotes the growth of your business rather than stifling it.

Reach For The Stars; Don’t Limit Yourself

Two of the key focuses of my blog are Business and Entrepreneurship, and Technology. In today’s digital world, it’s important to know that right mix of: technology usage, marketing, and knowing when to outsource to make your business competitive, whether it’s small or large. The following contributed post is thus entitled; Reach For The Stars; Don’t Limit Yourself.

* * *

Photo from here

It’s easy to think that small and large businesses are like chalk and cheese, and your small or home-based business is nothing like the larger firms of the world. However it’s simply not the case- you both have the same aims and objectives; you all want to turn a profit and provide a product or service to consumers that they’re currently missing. Sure, a bigger company will have lots more departments and processes in place, but there’s plenty of things that they do that you can also take advantage of in your small business. Don’t be limited or put obstacles in your way, don’t feel as though you’re not able to utilise certain methods just because you’re not a bigger business. Here are some examples.

Utilise the right tools and software
If you’re running a small or home based business, the temptation is there to save on software and do tasks manually. While this may be possible since you’re on a smaller scale, you’ll actually be losing out on money rather than saving it. Business software is something that can be utilised by firms of all sizes- you’ll boost productivity, reduce human error and save time too. This is time you could be spending doing something else, whether it’s in your business or in your personal life. You can find software for any department of your business these days, from accounting to legal software, customer relationship management, email management and much more. If you have room in your budget, you could even have bespoke software designed specifically for your business. On top of this, there are all kinds of tools that you could (and should) be using, regardless of the size of your firm. You can discover SEO rankings when using the right tools, PPC keywords and much more which will enable you to adjust your strategy for the best effect.

Market your business
Marketing is essential for businesses of all sizes. Even if you’re a small, local business who doesn’t sell online, you should have a marketing strategy in place to promote yourself. You will still need to be visible in search engine listings for when people search for local companies like yourself, and so a good website is essential. If you don’t sell online, your marketing will likely have a strong focus on things like flyers, posters and billboards so that people in the local community get to hear about you. Social media marketing is excellent also. If you do sell online, you’ll need to focus your efforts on further out- blogger outreach, Google ads and video marketing all might be options. Your marketing is important, don’t overlook this just because you’re not a huge company.

Outsource
If any of the tasks above sound like they’re out of your depth, there’s no need to worry. You can outsource anything these days, from entire departments of your business to single tasks. For example, you could outsource your marketing to a professional third party company who specialises in this. You could utilise freelancers to create content for your blog, or design your app or website. There are so many talented companies and individuals online who you can hire to run or tackle any area of your business. This ensures that everything is done to the best standard, and if you want to remain a sole trader it means you can get work done without having to hire staff. Many smaller companies believe that outsourcing is something that only big companies take advantage of, but you can outsource work regardless of the size of your business. And best of all, it could save you money too. While there will be a fee to pay the company or person, as they specialise in that area they have the knowledge and tools to be able to do things far more quickly than you. This boosts productivity and therefore profits. It frees up your time for you to tackle the elements of your business that you’re comfortable with and enjoy.

Don’t limit yourself, or believe that you’re any different to other businesses out there. No matter what the size, you all have the same objectives and there are tools that suit, or can be suited to any type of firm. Do your research, and don’t let the size of your company limit you! It’s completely possible to make a fortune right from your own home if that’s what you choose to do, as long as you go about things in the right way.