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Why You Should Consider Outsourcing for Your Business

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The key to working harder is to work smarter. Your business depends on you being able to do what you do best without being bogged down by the day to day tasks that can take up some time. Running your business automatically means you have a lot on your plate to manage meaning multi-tasking is the name of the game.

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But when it comes to the task in hand, you want to make sure your time and focus is where it needs to be and you aren’t tied up with tasks that take up too much of your day and pulling your attention elsewhere.

This is where outsourcing comes in. Regardless of if you have a team working with you or not, there are many advantages in hiring a third party to take care of tasks for you so you know you are getting the job done and done well. So what should you be looking at outsourcing?

Employees.

More specifically, the hiring of employees. you need to make sure you have the right people for your company, however, if you don’t have the time or expertise in interviewing and sifting through CVs, you may find outsourcing this task to a reputable company such as Checkr could be beneficial to you and your business.

Social Media

There is no denying that social is a huge marketing tool for almost every business. That being said, it takes up a vast amount of time to promote your business and create content to attract and engage potential customers across many different platforms. Hiring outside of your company means that not only do you not have to train a staff member or create a department to take from this for you, but you benefit from qualified professionals to be able to manage all of the content creation and promotion too.

Technology Services.

It can be expensive to make sure you are up to date with the latest technology services available. Even more expensive to keep a member of staff on-site to deal with any issues. Taking up a managed technology services package from an industry expert is one less thing you have to worry about maintaining for your business. Take advantage of their expertise and knowledge to keep you up and running at all times and not just when something goes wrong.

Administration

Think of replying to emails, following up on leads, enquires to scout for new business. Maybe you need business meetings transcribing or notes inputting into online files. All of this is something you could potentially hire a Virtual Assistant for.

Virtual Assistant work from remote locations and each one has a different set of skills. Once you find someone who can benefit your company you can work out a package that benefits you and your business with this then freeing your time to focus on areas you need to.

These are just a few areas where you can work smarter to help grow your business and meet your growing demands without pulling yourself in too many directions.

How to Use Outsourcing to Boost Your Profits

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Finances Article | How to Use Outsourcing to Boost Your Profits | Entrepreneurship | OutsourcingOutsourcing is a word that’s used a lot in business articles and guides for business owners, but is it really worth considering if you only have a small business or are a sole trader? If you think of outsourcing as something that only medium to large companies need to do, you’re missing out on a powerful way to boost your profits, because the benefits of outsourcing have no relation to the size of your business.

Because of its association with more sizeable businesses, outsourcing tends to be viewed as a situation where a whole section of a large corporation or organization is subcontracted to another company. For example, a hospital that pays a specialist cleaning company to undertake all the housekeeping duties.

There could be fifty or a hundred employees taking care of the hospital with not one of them being employed directly; the hospital pays the cleaning company, and the cleaning company deals with staff management. The hospital director gets a clean hospital without having to worry about looking after staff, equipment, recruitment, rotas, and all the other responsibilities of doing the cleaning in-house.

The test of whether outsourcing can work for you is to examine the numbers, which will tell you if outsourcing is viable in your circumstance or not. You may be a small business with a handful of employees or someone who works alone out of their back bedroom, but the same financial calculations are as applicable to you as they are to the hospital director. The bottom line is, can you earn more in the time it takes you to perform a task than it would cost you to pay someone else to do it? That’s the essence of how outsourcing boosts your profits in a nutshell.

In practice, what it means is that if your profit is $35 per hour as a freelance researcher, and it costs $20 an hour to employ an assistant to do all your admin, every hour you spend doing admin is costing you $15. If you spent those hours doing more paid work, you could have all your admin done for you and still be making money. In some cases doing tasks yourself could well be costing even more if you don’t have the skills to complete the task effectively and efficiently.

For instance, if you do all your own SEO, that could be taking you five hours each week, so straight away you’ve got the difference between how much you’re losing by not earning, and the cost of outsourcing the task. However you’ve also got the loss you’re incurring by spending more time than an expert would, and not being as effective as an expert at optimizing your business presence. By outsourcing to a specialist like Orlando SEO, you can devote more time to earning, and have a better return on the investment than you’d get if you carried on trying to do your SEO yourself.

Have a look at what you’re doing that could be done by someone else, and see how much it would cost to outsource those tasks. Even if you just take on a remote assistant to do two hours a week, if you make $35 an hour and pay them $15 an hour, over a year you’ll boost your profits by over $2,000 a year!

When Should Your Business Outsource Expert Advice?

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article |Outsourcing|When Should Your Business Outsource Expert Advice?Sometimes in business it’s useful to call upon expert advice rather than trusting your instincts. You can hire advisors for pretty much anything, but there are a few times in particular when such advice can be valuable. Here are just a few key times to seek advice.

Handling complex legal matters

Business law can be complex and that can be times when its worth getting advice to ensure that your company is meeting all the legal requirements that it should be. Advice may also be necessary when putting legal defence measures in places such as trademarks and health and safety measures, as well as making claims against other people. You can use sites like Lawbite to find a legal advisor suited to your cause.

Making difficult financial decisions

There may be times in business when you need to make difficult financial decisions. This could include finding ways to cut costs or searching for ways to find extra funding. Financial advisors can be useful to call upon in these situations and may know the best route to take in order to save you money. They may also be able to help you get out of business debt. There are many firms out there such as like Sterling & Law that specialise in giving financial advice to businesses.

Solving tech issues

Modern businesses are very reliant on technology. When this technology fails, expert advice if often needed – especially in the case of viruses and bugs. Outsourcing IT support via a company such as Frontline could help to keep your business protected. Such companies are able to offer support remotely so that you don’t have to wait for an IT technician to come out to your office.

Taking on your first employees

The decision to hire your first employees is a big step and requires putting in place multiple measures. This includes having a payroll system, adequate health and safety, insurance and the ability to afford their wages and other legally entitled benefits. Companies like BrightHR can help you with this, guiding you through all the requirements that you need to meet before you hire your first recruit. HR services may also be able to help with other employment-related queries.

Improving your marketing

Many forms of marketing can be DIYed, but sometimes it’s useful to seek some professional advice to ensure that you’re going about it the right way. Marketing consultants may be able to help you identify your target audience and the best ways of reaching them. They may also be able to help you work within a budget. Companies like Red Sky Strategy specialise in giving out marketing advice that is specialised to each client. Other companies may be able to offer specific advice catered to certain marketing strategies such as SEO or social media marketing.

3 Things That You Should Consider Outsourcing

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As a business owner, there are many decisions that you have to make, and one of them is whether you outsource or not. Whilst some people are outsourcing converts – and get most of their work done by external companies – others are a little more skeptical, and would prefer to have control over every part of their business in-house. Whilst this is understandable, there are a range of benefits of outsourcing, and if you’re not utilizing it in your business, then you could be missing out on saving money, and having the job done, well… better by somebody else.

We’ve put together a list of 3 things that you should consider outsourcing in your business.

StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article | Entrepreneurship | Outsourcing | 3 Things That You Should Consider Outsourcing
 
1. Your social media management

Social media seems like something that would be easy to manage yourself, because all you have to do is post out a few updates every now and again, to make sure that you’re drawing people in across the various platforms. However, getting social media right is actually a lot more complex than that, and outsourcing it means that you’ll be able to benefit due to those professionals that know the algorithms, and what works. On top of this, it’s actually harder than you think to come up with a few things a week to post, especially when you’ve got to think up those ideas that will cause a good reaction. Leave it to the professionals!

2. Your IT security

OK, so pretty much every business out there uses IT in some way, and we all enjoy the benefits that it brings us. After all, are there any people out there who aren’t checking their emails at least 50 times a day now? As people – and business owners – we are IT obsessed, but security is a complex and difficult thing to manage. Even if you’ve got somebody in-house to deal with issues such as networking monitoring, the truth is that most external cybersecurity companies are a lot more advanced, which means that you’ll be facing less problems in the long-run. It will probably be cheaper than hiring somebody in-house, too.

3. Your admin

When it comes to admin, there is arguably nothing more boring than dealing with these things. Whilst you want to be getting on with that good stuff, it’s pretty annoying that your phone is constantly ringing, and that you’re being bombarded with emails left, right, and center. There’s nothing that you can do about this though, right? You’ll be pleased to hear that you can get a virtual reception, where people answer your phone calls, and even deal with your mail, for you. This is ideal for those who can’t afford full-time admin staff, and it’s great if you just want to get rid of some of the pressure of office life.

So, if you want to take those first steps into the world of outsourcing, then consider handing over these 3 things to the professionals. You’ll be glad that you did when you’re saving yourself a lot of time, and money, in the process!

Outsourcing Might Be The Answer You’ve Been Looking For

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StrategyDriven Managing Your Business Article | Outsourcing | Entrepreneurship
 
One of the biggest challenges of running a business is simply the fact that there aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything that you need to. There are hundreds of businesses that had huge amounts of potential but fell apart simply because they took on too much and weren’t able to handle the workload or the pressure. There can sometimes be a sense of pride connected to how much of your business you are dealing with personally, but you should never let that get in the way of your success. So what is the answer? Since you can make the days any longer then there’s only one solution: share the workload. And the very best way to do that is through outsourcing. Outsourcing is simply hiring a professional in a particular field to handle a certain aspect of your business for you. That way you can focus your energy on more specific places, and you don’t end up feeling like you’re spread too thin. There are plenty of different areas of your business that you can outsource to other people, but here are some of the most common that you might want to consider.

Your IT

Let’s face it, we live in an intensely digital age and if your business isn’t able to reflect that then you’ve got a pretty major problem on your hands. Connecting to a company that can offer managed IT services for your business can help you make sure that you’re always right on the cutting edge of all modern digital developments. Otherwise, you run the risk of falling behind the competition entirely.

Your branding

It might sound kind of shallow but the truth is that without great branding, your business is never going to succeed. Customers will be drawn by what they see when they first look at your business and if your branding is ugly and amateurish, then they’re going to assume that your business simply isn’t worth dealing with. You need to make sure that you’re working with someone who can really make the most of your branding and help you connect with as many customers as possible.

Your finances

Despite how important they are to your business, not everyone is going to be an expert with numbers and figures. If that’s the case then hiring an accountant is going to save you a great deal of time and hassle. Not only that but you can be sure that your finances are always in order no matter what, that way you’re protected from any nasty surprises down the road. Not only that but your attention is now free to focus on the kinds of things that are really important to you.

The truth is that there are too many different parts of your business that would benefit from outsourcing to count. You need to think about the things that are really important to your business and make sure that you’re putting them in the hands of the people who can really make the most of them.