As your business grows, so does your workload. This might mean that you need to hire employees to cope with the increased demand and allow your business to continue to grow. When it comes to hiring to cover some of these tasks, you have two options.
One option is to hire employees who will work for your company. You can also outsource a task to a freelancer or a contractor. Outsourcing is usually the better option when you need a professional service but can’t justify hiring an employee for one specific task.
Here are a few different tasks that you should consider outsourcing.
Marketing is one of the most important and effective ways to reach more success when running a business. A good marketing campaign gets your name and brand out there so more customers know about your services and your business. The more people you reach, the more potential sales you can make.
However, marketing your business shouldn’t be the equivalent of standing on a rooftop and shouting about your brand. It should be targeted, so you aren’t investing in something that won’t work.
Market research will help you as you design your product and come up with marketing strategies, especially if you want to narrow down your target market.
However, most people aren’t professional marketing experts. While you might know the basics, like content marketing and social media marketing, it can be hard to capture trends and make your marketing efforts pay off.
Professional digital marketing companies are able to reach more and more people, so your website and your social media accounts can actually pay off. By outsourcing, you essentially open up your business to a lot more marketing success, as professional digital marketing agencies know how to best utilize SEO strategies and other digital marketing skills.
On a similar note, it can be beneficial to hire freelance writers. Different writers have different skills, but they can be very good for coming up with useful and interesting copy for your website.
You might hire writers for marketing purposes, or you might want to hire writers to come up with content for your website, whether you’re making a landing page or filling out a blog. Writing is a skill, especially if you want a lot of work done relatively quickly and without overusing AI.
While AI writing can come in handy and is much more advanced than it used to be, it’s still not the same as getting a person to write for you. AI can’t come up with original ideas. What you get is the same as whatever else is all over the internet. Even worse, some people can tell when you use AI, even without using an AI detector. It’s almost like it has an accent.
The balance you strike is up to you. Some people prefer to use human writers only, while others like to use AI and then tweak it to make it sound human. You can also use AI for idea generation or to come up with subheadings, which can make writing quicker and easier without sacrificing that human touch.
You can’t deny that accounting and bookkeeping are necessary parts of running a business. If you’re a sole trader, you can probably handle your books yourself. It’s not exactly a pleasant job, especially if you’re not numbers inclined, but if you keep decent records of everything your company spends and earns, it’s manageable.
However, the more your company grows, the less manageable your bookkeeping might become. Your company will have more expenses, including employee expenses, as well as more income streams. You might also be eligible for certain tax benefits.
Unfortunately, the government rarely understands when it comes to mistakes in your tax returns. This can result in fines or other penalties, which costs your business money and can be crippling.
This is why, as your business grows and becomes more complicated, it’s more important to hire a bookkeeper or an accountant. Ideally, you should use an agency or contractor that is geared toward your business needs. For example, AppFolio Accounting Services specializes in property management accounting, which makes it much easier for businesses to keep track of their accounts.
Modern businesses use technology and software to operate more efficiently. This might include running a business website or an intranet or online workspace for your employees to work. You might also store data and information on devices.
If these devices shut down, your business will often suffer. So, rather than hoping that the tech-savvy intern can deal with your IT needs or hiring a full team who won’t need to work a lot of the time, it’s best to outsource your IT support and service needs to a professional agency.
This means that you get support as and when you need it without having to pay someone a full-time wage as an employee.
As you deal with more customers, you might have to also deal with more customer service and support issues. People might ring in with questions, complaints, and other issues. When you have a lot of customers, this can be overwhelming for your team to deal with.
In this case, it’s a good idea to outsource to a customer support specialist. You can use a remote customer support team who can talk to your customers and deal with their issues. They can do this if things need to progress to the point where they speak to your employees.
A customer support switchboard is beneficial for you and your customer. It allows your customers to speak to a human agent rather than a computer, but they can also talk to someone who is trained in customer support. This means that you’re more likely to get a sale, you don’t have to train your employees in another department or hire a dedicated team, and your customers are happy because they get better service.