In this post and in posts to follow, we're going to touch on the subject of outsourcing and its benefits. We're first going to explain what it is and then we're going to show you some techniques for getting it done quickly, efficiently and as cheaply as possible. I knew you'd like the cheaply part.
Outsourcing is simply a matter of taking stock of the jobs that you need to have done for your business and deciding which things you'll handle on your own and which things you'll get an outside person or company to do.
When we are first starting our online business, or any business for that matter, we probably either can't outsource or don't need to either because we can't afford it or don't have much to do. Sometimes it's both. However, there are a lot of people who are just starting out online that actually need to outsource projects more than they realize.
Take for example a person who decides that he wants to put up a site about dog grooming. He knows all there is to know about the subject as he's been doing it for 15 years, so writing content for it shouldn't be hard at all. He does have one very big problem though. He knows nothing about web design and his idea of a graphic is a stick figure. This presents a huge obstacle to getting his website up and running. With his entire dog grooming knowledge, he is personally incapable of putting up a website.
Now, he could go take some courses in web design or maybe even just buy a few books. He could also take some courses in graphic design or buy some materials on that subject. Certainly all this is going to cost money though. So why not, if this is going to cost money anyway, simply go out and find somebody to do the work for you? With all your knowledge of dog grooming, you can certainly make the site profitable.
So this is a case where somebody just starting out would want to outsource some of the work.
What if you were putting up a site and you did know a lot about web design and graphic arts? Say you even were very knowledgeable about a certain niche like gardening. However, you knew nothing about writing sales copy and couldn't write an article to save your life in order to put content on your site. What do you do? You certainly don't want to let all that knowledge you have on gardening go to waste just because you're a lousy writer. Oh sure, you could learn. But in the meantime, don't you want to get your site up? After all, you are a whiz with web design and you know the site will be a knock out.
Am I making my point? So many people let opportunities go by because they lack certain skills and don't want to outsource those skills either because they think it's too much money or they're afraid to let anybody else touch their project. Yes, it's a scary world out there and con men are waiting to take advantage of us at every turn. Well, hopefully after reading the remainder of this series, you won't be afraid to outsource your work any longer.