Outsourcing: The Reality (Part One)
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Making the switch from Do-It-Yourself to paying someone else to do it, can be a difficult switch for a home business owner.
The first hurdle is having enough money to outsource, the second is the reluctance to relinquish 100% control over everything you create, and the third is the logistical difficulties that come with finding and managing the right people to work for you.
Whole books and courses have been written on the subject and, while they can give a healthy does of confidence and strategy, the one thing they can never supply you with is experience.
When you finally begin to outsource your work, it’s not uncommon to experience problems that you never even envisaged to begin with.
This article is not intended to compete with a comprehensive training product and it certainly isn’t going to claim to be a definitive voice on the topic. What it will do is let you inside the TRUE story of a number of successfully outsourced tasks that I carried out over the last 12 months.
Hopefully, by the time you finish reading this article, you’ll feel more inclined to start or increase outsourcing your work, you’ll have learned some important lessons from my mistakes, and maybe some handy tips along the away.
Lucid SEO
Although no money changed hands, in a sense, 100% of the Lucid SEO website was outsourced.
The project was conceived, designed, built and launched by myself, Tim Whiston and Roy Miller. More precisely:
Tim wrote the material and installed and customised the membership script,
I edited the material, created the videos and managed the launch and JV campaign,
And Roy wrote the sales copy and the affiliate material (and repeatedly cracked his whip until Tim and I got our finger out and finally got the work done).
You might consider this to be a joint venture, rather than outsourcing but really, all joint ventures are a form of outsourcing. Whenever ANYONE, other than you, works on something that contributes to your business, then it’s true to say that you outsourced that work.
Teaming up with one or more people to produce a project is a great way to start off your outsourcing experiences.
It doesn’t cost anything and, because your partners only profit when the project makes money, motivation shouldn’t be too much of a problem.
Ultimately, your overall profit may be lower as it’s likely that the percentage each partner takes will be in excess of what it would of cost to hire someone and pay them upfront. But if you’re worried that your skill set is inadequate to carry a project through to completion, then the support and shared responsibility of a joint venture can be extremely helpful.
Take Aways
If you’re wondering where you might find someone to work with, then internet marketing events are a good place to start. That isn’t to say that you should go to an event with the sole purpose of talking someone in to working with you. It simply provides an opportunity to quickly increase your range of contacts. Keep in touch with the people you naturally got along with and the chances are good that you’ll eventually find someone who you feel could be a good match.
If the idea of attending a real world event leaves you queasy, then you should visit one of my other sites – Networking Nightmares.
And, to be fair, an offline event is not the only way to make contacts.
I originally met Tim Whiston through an internet marketing forum and we appeared to see eye to eye on a lot of things. It was a number of years before we finally got round to working on a project together but, to this day, we’ve still never met in person.
And I met Roy Miller when he contacted me after joining one of my mailing lists.
That doesn’t mean you should immediately contact the owner of every list you belong to, but it does emphasis the importance of taking every opportunity to broaden your range of contacts.
May 29th, 2008 at 12:10 pm
Hey David,
Very interesting
I have recently read the 4 hour work week - and was inspired to start outsourcing more, and have now hired a full-time VA. It’s fantastic, but still really new - so I am keen to see what worked for you, and what didn’t!
Cindy
May 29th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
David, hi,
Interesting - and I’d never thought of working with someone else as ‘outsourcing’.
I teamed up with someone because his technical skills are a lot greater than mine - so now I can claim to have outsourced some stuff (but, I have to admit, without realising that I’d actually done it!!)
Cheers,
Martin
May 29th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Hiring people to help you can speed up your progress or just make things a bit easier. I’ve hired webmasters previously and often found them cranky and difficult to work with. Recently me and a buddy hired a graphics guy through Rentacoder and we’re really pleased.
A big difference between outsourcing and Joint Ventures is that outsourcing is cheaper! I’m paying the rentacoder guy once but my JV partners get an ongoing share in the profits!
The other side of that is that my JV partner will work for no pay until the product is launched - an outsourcer wants prompt payment!
All The Best
Alex
May 29th, 2008 at 2:02 pm
Hi David
Just a quick note, I like doing all the work,
I must have the wrong mindset. But outsourcing
will increase profitablity?Thanks for the info
Paul
http://www.squidoo.com/artart
May 29th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Hi David,
Sounds very like my own experiences with trying to hire programmers. I went through a lot of duds before I found the right one!
Thanks for sharing.
Garland
May 29th, 2008 at 6:05 pm
Hi Cindy - I gave hiring a VA a try (through GetFriday) after reading the four-hour work week but, unfortunately, after about six months I decided I just wasn’t getting enough use out of it.
A lot of the work I wanted they couldn’t do because it wasn’t in their skill-set (installing a phpbb forum update, for example). Installing a new script I wanted to test was also not permitted (even though it came with a user manual).
The few bits of research they did were hit and miss. One or two were quite good, but others were a bit patchy. For example, I asked for research on companies that could install and customise scripts - the results were all companies from India. Not that I have anything against programmers from India, you understand, but it did suggest that perhaps the research had not been as broad as I’d asked for.
In another instance, I managed to find better information than they’d supplied with about ten minutes googling…
I think it’s important to try and find the right kind of work that fits the VA you’re working with - but in the end it was easier to increase my “in-house” admin’s hours and give the work to her.
All fun stuff eh?
May 30th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Hi there David! My name is Debbyanne and i hope you do not mind me asking you a question? I joined you would say like an affiliate company and have my own free online shop and part of the business is to sell free online shops to customers and products. I am completely new to internet business and have got so much information on splash pages and joined traffic sites to help understand how i promote my site as it comes with a fully built website.and training. I would like to know how i get customers interested in buying and understanding down lines. I do not know how to let people know about my site and to promote it is there a way i can do it on a budget as i am not financially well off. If you couldd help me i would really appreciate it and found your blogs easy to understand and informative. Ps. How can i also do a splash page on the traffic sites as i do not understand how and how to add banners and text links? HElP!
May 30th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
Hi Debby
I’m not a big fan of downlines or anything connected to MLM, so I’m not the best person to advise you on that.
If you’re looking to promote products as an affiliate though, then the two most effective ways I can think of to generate free traffic is either by using traffic exchanges, or creating some original content and using SEO techniques to rank it in the search engines.
There’s a good starter guide to traffic exchanges in the Traffic Soliders members area. It’s free to join:
http://www.trafficsoldiers.com/?rid=212
And, of course, you can study SEO at my Lucid SEO site (not free though I’m afraid):
http://www.lucid-seo.com
Hope that helps.
May 31st, 2008 at 11:06 am
Hi,
Yes, I’ve had a few outsourcing nightmares too. One tip I’d like to share is to make the contract price conditional on timely delivery. For example, if project delivered by X date, then price paid is $Y. If project delivered after X date then price is $Z. If agreed at start, then incentive all round to get the job done quickly. I have found, especially with coders, that deadlines often slip an if you’re not careful, days can turn into weeks into months…
One other quick tip. I have also tried outsourcing some clerical and SEO (social bookmarking etc.) work. I have found that you need to set a time budget for each task. Otherwise, you may find that your job get pushed down the list and most probably, you end up paying for someone else’s work.
Hope this helps.
All the best, Allen