Any business owner has plenty to deal with within a single day. Yet, not all that work should be carried out singlehandedly. By considering outsourcing and opening the doors to virtual assistants or agencies to engage with some of your daily tasks, you can spend a lot more of your time towards growing your business. Although outsourcing until recently was seen as a strategy reserved only for big businesses, technology nowadays has made it an accessible tool for many small businesses as well. With a bit of an effort, outsourcing can have a powerful impact on any business's growth and productivity.
Of course, starting with outsourcing can be a time-consuming activity, yet learning how to build your business with help from professionals outside your company could offer increased efficiencies and economies of scale. A great number of entrepreneurs realize they can have an unstoppable power through the scales of outsourcing.
When You Should Outsource
For every company, the right time to outsource can be different. Some businesses have in-house staff that can handle all daily activities but may need help when it is time to undertake new projects that don't require another full-time employee. For very small businesses, on the other hand, outsourcing can happen from the very beginning. Just start out with a bookkeeper and a virtual assistant, and continue growing your team from there. The types of tasks that are best outsourced fall into three general categories:
- Highly skilled expertise - For example, having a CFO-level person that can come in a few times each month to provide financial analysis of the business and ensure the bookkeeper is handling your books well;
- Highly repetitive tasks - Within this category most often you will see data entry, Accounts payable or shipping inventory for example;
- Specialized knowledge - A good example of this can be the network specialist or IT support for the accounting system. If you are a small business owner, you might not need or afford a full-time IT person, plus it's a lot easier to change the outsourced provider with the right skill set as your IT preferences change.
Deciding What Should be Outsourced
As a result of the above-mentioned general categories, the areas in which businesses should outsource the most are:
Accounting and payroll - Accounting is a time-consuming activity, and it can be quite difficult if you don’t have any previous experience with it. And of course, if there is one thing you do not want to mess up will be your money. So, outsourcing your payroll and general accounting would not only help your business while you can manage the money better, but it will also help you to stay away from getting into trouble with the IRS once tax season is on.
Customer service and support - Providing great customer service is one of the most important features of any successful business. Today, customers expect to be able to get in touch with your business 24/7. One of HubSpot analysis showed that 90% of customers would expect an immediate response (being 10min or less), characterizing it as important or very important when they have a customer service question. By outsourcing your customer service, you can answer emails, phone calls or social media messages at all times. Plus, you can also get multilingual support so you can reach more of your customers.
Digital marketing - If you want your business to be successful, you have to be online. And the best way to do that is to have either assistants or digital marketing agency that will push your promotional strategy to your online audience. As there are so many parts to digital marketing such as SEO, email marketing, blogging, social media marketing, and many others, mastering even just a few of these areas is nearly impossible.
But when you have a virtual assistant (or agency) that will handle all management and supervisory functions when it comes to the marketing, you can be involved as much as you want to be. This will give you enough time for you to be able to learn as much as you want about the marketing processes at your own pace plus you will not feel pressured to make decisions without having all the information you need.
Let's not forget the saving money and improving budgeting moment. As the online world changes quickly, a dedicated marketing person (or team) will make sure to keeps up with those developments so you do not need to. An agency will know how to use many of the recent software tools, research techniques or marketing applications so your marketing can be even more effective.
Creative work - If your business needs to develop some branded videos, this is the one area where you need to make sure that you hire a professional, someone with plenty of experience. Amateur content does not get companies off the ground. Although it can be a bit more expensive, it is for the best if you pay a specialist. The Preveer payoff for sure will justify the expense, plus it will help your business to grow even faster.
Administrative tasks - It is important to focus on growing your business and not getting spending your time in menial administrative tasks. A virtual assistant can assist you daily and make sure your business runs smoothly by completing all repetitive business tasks. Scheduling and appointment-setting, performing data entry, responding to emails, managing calls using business phone services - that can be all outsourced and part of your past.
Enjoying the Outsourcing Benefits
Outsourcing offers businesses great advantages. The process allows you to create a team of skilled professionals without the expense of full-time employees, and many tasks being completed without your attention. it is an affordable, proven strategy for growing the business without letting it take over your professional and personal life.
Handing off work will force you to objectively yet ruthlessly and systematically consider what are your activities and the steps you need to take to perform them. When you outsource, your time, energy and attention can be focused on your company's core competencies, all while spending time for setting new goals and finding ways how to achieve them.
