I added a comment over at Anna Haller’s valuableinternetmarketing.com in relation to a great post she made about outsourcing. The article is well worth reading if you have ever wondered why it seems that you always struggle to get a spare moment away from your business.
I have made a copy of the comment below, but I do encourage you to check out Anna’s post as well.
Effective outsourcing is similar to productive teamwork. When the team share a common vision their output is multiplied so much more than the combined total of what would be possible if it was all done as a group of individuals.
The key, as noted above, is in knowing what and how to delegate and what to do yourself.
I believe targeted scaling to be a huge factor in the success of any business. Any activity that had a direct connection with profit such that if you double the effort on that activity you double the profit, then that activity is a prime candidate for outsourcing. By outsourcing you can scale up the most profitable activities while still concentrating on putting your own effort into the strategic core activities that comprise ‘your’ business.
Do you want to be successful in your business? Do you want profits beyond what you believe ‘you’ can produce? Then outsourcing is one of the most effective ways to increase the work effort you invest in your business while not burning yourself out.
Last month I posted about all internet businesses need support. In that post I emphasised the need to spend money if you want to experience any degree of success. You can do it alone, without spending much more than a few dollars a month, but it will cost you many more hours than you have available to achieve the degree of success that even the most modest of internet businesses enjoy.
You owe it to yourself, your health and your family or loved ones, to consider how you can get help to do those things you either do not have the time (be realistic here) or the skills to do yourself.
Do yourself and your business a favour and read Anna’s post about outsourcing. It could save you a lot of time and trouble.
Related posts:
Hey Michael,
Thanks for the heads up…I’ll be heading over to check out the post after this!
In this indusrty it can often seem like there just aren’t enough hours in the day and I’ve only just recently re-discovered the importance of ‘Taking Time Off’ to recharge and reflect. This will be an interesting read!
Rob
(** RJB **)
** RJB **´s last [type] ..Really Important But Often Overlooked…
Thanks Rob for stopping by and adding to the conversation. Anna has been publishing a lot of good content and I recommend you sign up to her blog so you don’t miss out on any of her work.
Quality of life is so important. There is little point in throwing ourselves so much into our business ventures that there is nothing left to enjoy the other times.
Twitter: barry_wells
says:
Hi Michael, thanks for bringing that to our attention. I’ve been over and had a read and told Anna that you sent me.
As you know Michael, i’m fairly new to this and as a result have been trying to do everything myself until i start to earn an income from it and then i’ll be looking to outsource.
The first thing i will outsource is article writing. I find article writing so time consuming that i don’t get anything else done. I think a lot of it is confidence, which is growing, slowly!!
Thanks Michael, back soon my friend.
Barry
Barry@The Newbies Guide´s last [type] ..Is This The Age of Disposable Computers
It is difficult to contemplate paying someone else to do work for you when there is no income from an activity. As you would know, it can sometimes be necessary to spend money in order to make money. I bit the bullet, so to speak, with article writing for another site and I was glad I did. It only cost between $3 and $5 per article for about 10 articles from 3 different authors. Some were unable to be used (the $3 ones) but thankfully from that small experiment I was able to identify a quality writer (the $5 one). I haven’t used a writer for this blog and probably wont as I enjoy that part of it. I do outsource some product creation work just to get the ‘guts’ of it together then I add the fine-tuning myself. That may change as the business grows. I used oDesk.com but there are other sites.
If I like doing something and I have the time and passion for it I will generally not outsource that.
Thanks for dropping by and mentioning it to Anna.
Twitter: tomoscrowle
says:
Wow you managed to get decent quality articles for $5 each. I use peopleperhour.com and I have spent at least £14 per article. That is about $22 per article. My skills are not in article writing so I am willing to spend the money. I guess outsourcing for a job you can do yourself is almost pointless unless someone can do it cheaper, better or your time is more useful elsewhere.
Sure did Tom. It does depend a lot on how many writers are competing for your business at the time you get quotes. I had more than 20 come back to me when I put out the job. Some were up to $20 per article and some were $1 per article. Just to test it I took on one of the $1 people as well as a $5 person and discovered, not unsurprisingly, that you do get what you pay for
.
The $5 article needed a few tweaks but it got me 90% of the way and I just added the final 10% – sub-headings, a couple of word tweaks and a picture.
Michael, the main things I outsource now are web design and graphics stuff. I can put up a WordPress site and customize it with the Thesis options, but that’s about it.
John Soares @ Information Products´s last [type] ..Selling Information Products Weekend Reading 2010-06-25
I outsourced some article writing and graphic design for another site a while ago and it was reasonably successful. I found that especially with the articles, by having someone else write them I was introduced to some other valid points of view that I would perhaps not have given much thought to had I written them all.
Twitter: anna_haller
says:
Hi Michael,
I appreciate you mentioning me in your post and you are absolutely right, we need to leverage ourselves so that we don’t get burnt out as internet marketing can really do that to you sitting behind a computer for hours on in.
We also need to realize that we can’t do everything ourselves and outsourcing is the best way to duplicate our efforts to see maximum results.
Take care Michael and I’m glad you liked my post.
Anna
Anna Haller´s last [type] ..Are you alone
You are most welcome. I too am looking forward to the follow-up post on outsourcing.
Twitter: icebluebanana
says:
Hi Michael,
I have not been blogging long & have never considered outsourcing. Yours and Anna’s comments are making me consider what I can to to be more productive without doing much more myself.
Thanks for the ideas & have a great day!
mark´s last [type] ..Online Questions and Conversation with Hulbert
Hi Mark, not everything is suited to outsourcing but it is one way you can buy more time in your day and boost your profits at the same time. I am no expert in the field. For that you would want to follow Chris Ducker to start with http://twitter.com/chriscducker.
Michael
Thank you, kindly for the mention.
If anyone is contemplating Outsourcing for either an easier life, or business growth, please hop on over to my blog, and I’d be happy to answer any questions, etc.
Anna has a great blog building over there, too. I thoroughly enjoyed an interview she did with me recently on Outsourcing. She’s a great resource.
All the best,
Chris
Edit (Michael) Anna’s post on outsourcing
Anna’s post with links to the interviews about outsourcing
I agree, it’s not possible to everything alone. There is need to outsource some activities like content writing or seo.
Alex@Giochi Super Mario´s last [type] ..Mario Bros Racing Tournament
You’re absolutely right about putting some money into your business and leveraging your time to get some massive results. Be wise in spending but invest in the right things with proper research.
Kevin Tan´s last [type] ..The All-In-One Social Media Platform- Friendfeed
I absolutely agree with you. Outsourcing tasks to more competent people is the reason why our civilization developed, why there’s such thing as economy in the first place. If we did everything with our own hands and minds, like harvesting food, making homes, constructing machines, we would still live in stone age. Specialization is the core of today’s economy. It’s also the core of every individual business. If a business owner wants to do all the operations by himself, he will never grow his business, and just won’t develop. According to Robert Kiyosaki, such behavior characterizes not a business owner but entrepreneur, the moment he stops working, all processes stop as well.
Now, I find this to be the most difficult task for my business – converting it from entrepreneurship to actually business. The first and the main step in this process is letting go of total control, and learning to delegate tasks to other people. I am only in the beginning of the journey, but at least I realize the urgent need for it.
Christine´s last [type] ..How to Select a Killer Topic for Research Paper- From Subject to Topic to Research Question
Thanks Christine for sharing your journey so far. Without outside help it is still possible to achieve some things but we can never be great all alone. Enjoy the journey. Michael.
Story added…
Your story was featured in postonfire.com! Here is the link to vote it up and promote it: http://postonfire.com/Blogging/100_of_all_businesses_are_destined_for_failure_without_support...
Twitter: eugenefarber
says:
Outsourcing isn’t only good business…but it could mean your business’ survival I think. Yes, you CAN do everything yourself…but will you?
I think a lot of internet start-up entrepreneurs quit before ever really getting started because they get overwhelmed with work and get discouraged.
By outsourcing you can save yourself a lot of time and see results sooner…which can encourage you to keep going (especially if you outsource multiple tasks to multiple people – then you can get results REALLY fast).
The trick, I think, is to get some mentoring in the best way to outsource. Sort of like outsourcing the outsourcing, so to speak, at first so that it is done efficiently and you don’t fall into any newbie traps.
The day that we started outsourcing and hiring virtual assistants was the day we actually started running our business!
business mentors´s last [type] ..8 Ways to Generate New Business
LOL. I can relate to that. I was doing so much myself to start with – and that is probably a good way to start – but it got to the point where I was becoming snowed under with little technical challenges. When I started outsourcing basic tasks I discovered the amazing value and advantages of geographic arbitrage. For a small outlay I got several people working for me with no payroll tax, no sick leave, no commute problems and I became a whole lot more productive.
Absolutely amazing topic, when we stuck in the problem me think that we are all alone to deal with and the problem occur to us alone. Our believe should be firm. Very nice blog.
I totally agree with this article, we are the one responsible for our failure, but by failing we are developing our knowledge for us not to commit the same mistakes again, not only in life but i our own work.
Kate Brown Wilson´s last [type] ..יועצת שינה
I’m glad you like the article. Whenever I can I share this principle to people I meet in business and socially.