Category Archives: Outsourcing

3 Ways To Use Outsourcing To Grow Your Business & Free Up Your Time

Outsourcing a host of specific tasks and activities is an incredible opportunity for you to grow your business while you perform only your most valuable work you love to do.

That’s because if you try to do everything in your business all by yourself, you’re going to run out of time every day to do what you need to do.

Sure, your business will still grow if you try to do everything yourself… but very slowly. However a set of tasks you have and may take you months to complete may only take a few days or a week to complete when you hire professionals to do them for you.

But this doesn’t mean you can just willy-nilly toss your money at freelancers and expect your business to grow automagically. Truth is, you need to be smart about outsourcing.

Your business is full of hundreds of tasks, so you need to invest your resources in the tasks that will accelerate your business growth. These essential tasks fall into three categories:

Identifying Gaps. These are the gaps in where your business is now versus where you want it to be.
Creating or Upgrading Assets. These are items like products which generate profits.
Improvements & Upgrades. These are the tasks you outsource which allow you to make better use of your own time.

Let’s look at each of these categories in more detail…

Outsourcing Category #1: Gaps

I don’t know a single business owner that doesn’t have gaps in their business, which is the distance between where they are and where they want or need to be. I’m sure you have gaps too, such as:

Places where you’re stuck and can’t move forward. For example, you can’t finish the copy for a product until the product is finished. You can’t put the sales copy on a site until the website is up and running.
Things you don’t know how to do. For example, perhaps you don’t know how to set up a WordPress blog or write sales copy
Places where you face a deadline that you can’t meet. For example, perhaps you promised your partners a specific date for a product launch, but now you know your deadline was overly optimistic and you won’t be able to meet it.
When life gets in the way. Perhaps something has happened in your personal life, such as a death in the family, illness or a new baby. Outsourcing can keep your business running and profitable while you deal with personal issues.
When you face an unexpected crisis. Perhaps your website got hacked or your computer crashed. Outsourcing can help you get back up and running.

So as you can see, there are quite a few things you can outsource in this category, depending on your wants, needs and your business goals.

Let me give you some specific examples of tasks you can outsource that will help you fill in the gaps in your business:

Set up a website. This includes designing the site and installing any necessary scripts.

Manage the technical details of your website on an ongoing basis. For example, you could hire someone to manage your databases and update your scripts.

Create an autoresponder series. You could have this person create a five-part mini course designed to promote a specific product.

Plan a pay per click advertising strategy. This person could also manage your PPC advertising campaigns on an ongoing basis.

Plan a social media marketing strategy. You might have someone plan one aspect (such as Facebook marketing), or help you plan and integrate all major social media platforms into your overall marketing plan.

Find and recruit affiliates. This person could also manage your affiliate program on an ongoing basis, such as by running contests, sending out motivational emails to affiliates, sending payments (if you’re using a self hosting affiliate program), and other management tasks.

Create content for your blog. This includes ongoing how to articles, tips articles, product reviews and other content.

Write content for guest blogging. You can also hire someone to locate these sorts of lucrative guest blogging opportunities, and contact the blog owners on your behalf.

Create a sales letter for your site. Your copywriter can also create other sales materials to support the sales letter, such as a video sales letter script, solo emails and pay per click ads.

Write a report. This could be a freebie to get people into your sales funnel, a paid product, or a bonus product to go along with your main offers.

Design an infographic. You can hire someone to put together the design only, or you can hire someone to do all the research as well.

Develop an app. This could be a lead magnet or a paid product. It might even be a web-based app you offer to members of your membership site.

Improve conversions. This person could test, track and tweak your sales letters, ads and overall marketing campaigns.

Scout out lucrative advertising opportunities. This person can find ad venues and report back to you about the cost, the site’s demographics, as well as their impressions of the overall quality of the site.

Arrange interviews and other publicity opportunities for you. For example, your person can land interview spots with local media, as well as national outlets such as talk radio. This person can also create and submit regular press releases.

Convert your text products into other formats. For example, this person could convert a book into an audio, video or even a Kindle book.

Optimize your website for the search engines (SEO). Your SEO specialist can optimize your site’s structure and content, as well as do a link-building campaign.

Plan a viral marketing campaign. Your consultant can help you design content and campaigns that are likely to go viral. Some freelancers even have connections or networks to help kick start the initial viral effect.

Plan a sales funnel. If you tend to get caught up in the small details and not see the big picture, you may want to hire someone to help you plan your entire sales funnel.

Do market research. This will help you identify profitable niches and products.

Think of it this way: outsourcing in this way allows you to reach a place where you make money that you would otherwise miss out on. Why not spend $25, $100, or $500 in order to make two, five, or ten times more?

Example: Perhaps you pay someone to create a report that costs you $300. Over the next couple of weeks you sell a couple of hundred copies of this report for $10 a pop ($2000 total), which builds your customer list and nets you a profit of $1700. That’s a good way to grow your business.

Now let’s look at the next category:

Category #2: Assets

These are the aspects of your business that directly turn a profit for you today as well as over the long term. If you were to sell your business, you’d be able to sell these assets as part of the business.

Your assets include things such as:

Reports
Ebooks
Videos
Audios
Apps
Websites
Your mailing lists (customers, prospects and joint venture/affiliate lists)

… and any other products or properties you own.

This category is all about your return on your investment (ROI). You pay $X for a particular asset, and then you make $Y in profit. Let me give you specific examples:

Example 1: A Video Product

Let’s suppose you’re creating a step-by-step “how to” video product in your niche. Let’s suppose you get someone to create the script for you for $500, and you get someone else to create the video for $1500. That’s a $2000 investment.

Now let’s suppose you sell this product for $40. Once you hit 50 customers, you’ve recouped your investment. Every customer thereafter is a $40 frontend profit, and everything you make on the backend is yours to keep.

Example 2: A PLR Package

There are two ways to go with this example.

· The first way is to create a PLR package that you sell to others. For example, perhaps you get a product created for $1000, and then you charge $100 for the PLR (private label rights) license fees. After the 10^th license you’ve recouped your investment, and every sale after that is profit.

· The second example is to purchase PLR content and then hire someone to tweak the content. This example has a bigger potential for long-term profits, since you can sell the content for as long as you want. (E.G., there are no license limits.)

For example, you purchase the content and license for $100. You pay someone else another $100 to tweak the product so it’s more unique. That’s a $200 investment. Now you sell this product for $15. By the time you’ve made your 14^th sale, you’ve already more than recouped your investment.

Example 3: An App, Plugin or Other Software

Software products tend to be among the most expensive to outsource, due to both the skill involved and the time it takes to code and develop this sort of project. However, you can often charge a premium price for these products as well.

For example, let’s suppose you get a piece of software developed for $5000, and you charge $197 for the end product. It just takes 26 sales before you’ve recouped your investment and you’re starting to pocket a profit.

Example 4: A Turnkey Package

Let’s suppose you want to sell a new product and outsource the whole enchilada. Below you’ll find an example of the cost for each piece of this package:

· The main product (an ebook), $1000

· Two bonuses, $700

· A freebie report to get people onto the prospect mailing list, $300

· The sales letter to sell this package, $1000

· Someone to set up the website (such as installing WordPress), $200

That’s $3200 total.

Let’s suppose you sell the product and bonuses for $50. You just need 64 sales to recoup your investment. But the cool thing is you’ll have all these assets that you can profit from for years to come, including the product, two bonuses, the freebie, the customer mailing list and the prospect mailing list. Together, this collection is darn near priceless.

Do you see how this works?

So now let’s have a look at the final important category…

Outsourcing Category #3: Upgrades

The idea here is that you outsource so that you can “upgrade” the use of your own time.

For example, you can outsource:

Things you don’t know how to do. Sometimes your time is better spent working on high-value tasks as opposed to learning how to do certain other tasks.

For example, maybe outsourcing an infographic is smarter than taking the time to learn how to do it yourself. Or perhaps you’d rather hire someone to develop your site as opposed to learning the coding language yourself.

Things you don’t want to do. If you really just hate a task, you may find yourself procrastinating on it, or you may find yourself rushing through it and not getting a very good end result. This is the sort of stuff you can outsource.

For example, if writing a blog posts is worse than pulling teeth for you, then outsource it to someone else. Or if you hate messing with the accounting and tax end of your business, then get yourself an accountant to keep the books.

Things you’re not very good at. Maybe you know a certain task just doesn’t fall in your skill set, in which case you should outsource.

For example, you can hire someone else to create the graphics for your site. Or perhaps you find that your sales copy couldn’t sell shoes to Imelda Marcos, in which case you can hire a good copywriter to do this work for you.

Low-value tasks. Even if there are certain things you know how to do, your time would simply be better spent elsewhere.

For example, hiring someone else to deal with the day-to-day customer service inquiries frees your time to focus on a high-value task, such as finding joint venture partners.

So, the bottom line is that you can outsource many tasks to grow your business. However, be smart about it, because your business will grow even faster if you focus on Gaps, Assets and Upgrades.

I’d love to hear how from you in the comments below on how you are outsourcing tasks and activities in your business.

Talk soon,

Rocky

P.S. Outsourcing your list building activities are are great way build your email list, but as we’ve discussed in other posts, running a Product launch is one of the fastest ways to not only build your list, but generate Social Proof and make a large number of sales quickly. To learn how to launch your product successfully, check out Jeff Walker’s free Product Launch Masterclass here.

PLUS: When you’re ready, here are 3 ways I can help you to grow your business using product launches:

1. How To Build A Profitable Launch List.
Building an email list is critical if you plan on doing a launch for your product, service or business. List Warrior will show you a proven way to use free software to build a responsive list of prospects who are ready to buy from you during your launch. Click Here.

2. How To Create The Perfect Product
Creating a product that is perfect for your audience does not need to be difficult. How To Create The Perfect Product shows you how to build high value products your audience will love one after the other. Click Here.

3. How To Attract Buyers To Join Your Launch List So They Can Purchase Your Perfect Product.
Once you have created your Product Launch List and your Perfect Product is ready to go, you need to attract people into your world so they can buy from you. One Minute Free Traffic gives you a proven way to attract buyers with ‘Automated Traffic Machines’ so you can send those people to your optin page, your sales page, your Facebook Group or anywhere else you choose. To learn more Click Here.

And don’t forget to check this out 🙂

How to Earn $20 in 20 Minutes With Any Topic, Niche or Hobby

Disclaimer: If you purchase PLF through my affiliate link I may receive a referral fee from Jeff Walker, however you will pay no more to purchase the program through me than if you went directly to the Product Launch Formula website. If you would like my personal help as you create your first launch using the PLF process, check out my PLF Bonus offer here.

How To Outsource The Product Launch Stuff You Don’t Want To Do

If you are considering using a product launch to quickly grow your business, one of the best things you can do for your sanity is to learn how to make it as hands-free as possible.

In fact, this goes for everything you do in your business.

If you can outsource the stuff you don’t want to do, the stuff you don’t like to do, and the stuff you don’t know how to do, you can focus on the more important stuff that helps you to grow and prosper.

Now if you’ve never done any outsourcing before, you might be scratching your head.

How, exactly, do you go about figuring out what to outsource, and then finding a good freelancer to complete the tasks?

That’s what this series of posts is about.

Over the next 4 posts, you’ll discover a four-step process which includes:

1. Determining Your Needs. In this first post I’ll be explaining where, what, and when to outsource for your business.

2. Advertising Jobs. Then in the next post, you’ll learn how to write a good job description to make sure you get what you are paying for.

3. Evaluating And Hiring Freelancers. In the 3rd post in this series, you’ll learn how to screen candidates and pick the best freelancer for your project.

4. Managing Projects. And in the forth post, I’ll give you some battle-tested insights into making sure your projects go smoothly.

OK, now let’s walk through the first of these four parts of the process…

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Step One: How To Determine Your Product Launch Outsourcing Needs

There are three questions to ask yourself to help you determine needs.

Question 1: When should you outsource?

Here are three good times when you should consider outsourcing a task:

• When you don’t have time to do the task yourself. Perhaps you have other work, family and social obligations. Or perhaps this is a low-value task, and you need to free up your time to focus on high-value tasks. These are good times to outsource.

• When you don’t know how to do the task yourself. Maybe you don’t know anything about it, so it would take too long and there would be a big learning curve. Or perhaps you just don’t know how to do it well, meaning a freelancer would be able to offer a better end result.

• When you don’t want to do the task yourself. Ever notice that you procrastinate on things you really don’t want to do? Don’t force yourself – just outsource the task to someone who’ll cheerfully produce a great end result for you.

In other words, if you’re stuck and not moving forward very quickly, then outsource the task.

Which brings us to the next question…

Question 2: What should you outsource?

The sky is the limit when it comes to outsourcing.

Let’s look at a quick list of common tasks:

• Content creation. This may your product launch content (including pre-launch content and email sequences, and even the product itself), ongoing newsletters for both prospects and customers, blog posts, social media posts, PDF reports, ebooks, video scripts, and more.

• Social media management. Your freelancer may create and post traffic generation content on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms. They may also help you develop an overall social media launch strategy, depending on their skills and experience.

• Graphic design. This includes web graphics, video presentation graphics, product graphics and more.

• Planning. Here you can hire an expert to help you plan and strategize various parts of your launch and/or other parts of your business, such as marketing or your launch sales funnel.

• Data entry. This sort of task is a great one to outsource, as it’s a low-value task (which frees up your time to focus on high-value tasks), and it requires very minimal skills to complete.

• Customer support. You can hire people to both answer phones and deal with inquiries sent through your help desk. This may be a permanent position, or you may hire people temporarily during expected influxes (such as during your product launch).

• Video editing and production. Most product launches are video based these days, so unless you have skills and experience with video production, this is a task that’s best left to someone else.

• Administrative assistance. You can hire someone to help you with a myriad of day to day jobs, from research to content creation to data entry and more.

• Research. A competent freelancer can help you do market research, product research and more. Your freelancer might give you a report of their findings with links and data, or they may find the resources and let you interpret the data. It all depends on their skill set.

• Traffic generation. Generally, this involves hiring multiple experts to focus on their area of specialty (such as media buys, affiliate marketing, SEO, pay per click, etc).

• Copywriting. A sales letter or ad can make or break the success of your product launch, which is why it’s a good idea to hire a professional copywriter to create these materials for you.

• Legal services. Here’s one area where you should absolutely hire a professional. This includes creating policy documents for your site, reviewing agreements, helping you incorporate, and other legal issues that come up.

• Transcription. If you plan to include videos, audios or webinars as part of your product, you can pay somebody to transcribe them into text very inexpensively through Rev.com.

• Order fulfilment. If you’re shipping physical products, or you need to manually deliver digital bonuses for an affiliate promotion, you can hire someone else to take care of fulfilment.

• PowerPoint® presentation. If you do slide-share presentations for webinars, videos or conferences, you can hire a professional to make your presentation look great.

• Lead generation. This person can help you set up your lead page, tweak it for good conversions, and drive traffic to it.

• Installations and set up. A good freelancer can help you with everything from installing a WordPress blog, to installing complex ecommerce systems.

• Email marketing. You can hire someone to help you create your launch email sequence, as well as better autoresponder sequences that boost your open and click-through rates, meaning you’ll sell more through email.

• Accounting. A good accountant can save you money by ferreting out tax deductions that you didn’t even know about.

• Public relations. A good PR person can send out compelling press releases and land media interviews during your launch so you get additional publicity and exposure.

• Blogging. You can hire someone to create content for your blog, handle blog comments, and publish content on a regular basis.

• Document formatting. You can hire someone to format your Kindle book, ebooks or other documents, which will give your readers a great first impression.

• Affiliate recruiting. You can hire an affiliate manager to find, recruit and motivate affiliates.

• Search engine marketing. This includes SEO (search engine optimisation) as well as PPC (pay per click) marketing using platforms such as AdWords.

Next question…

Question 3: Where you should outsource?

You can cast a wide net by using one or more of the following methods:

1. Post a project to a freelancing site. This includes sites such as Guru.com, UpWork.com, and Fiverr.com

This is the method I recommend in this report, since you get access to freelancer ratings, as well as some amount of protection through most freelancing sites.

For example, some sites run an escrow service, which protects both you and the freelancer.

2. Search Google. For example, you might search for “ghostwriter” or “software developer.”

Be sure to check the organic results as well as the sponsored results (ads).

3. Ask for recommendations from trusted sources.

This includes your colleagues, mentors, and other associates.

You can also ask on business and marketing forums or Facebook groups.

So now we’ve covered the first step in getting started with outsourcing, your head might be spinning with all of the possibilities 🙂

But before you race out and start hiring, you’ll need to know how to create a specific and detailed project description (AKA a brief) in order to find the most qualified person for the job and to get the best results.

And that’s what we’ll be covering for you in the next post.

Warm regards,

Rocky

PLUS: When you’re ready, here are 3 ways I can help you to grow your business using product launches:

1. How To Build A Profitable Launch List.
Building an email list is critical if you plan on doing a launch for your product, service or business. My 1-2-3 List Building Cheat Sheet will show you how to build a responsive list of prospects who are ready to buy from you during your launch. Click Here.

2. How To Create A Signature Product Out Of Thin Air In 72 Hours Or Less
Creating your product does not need to take weeks or months. My 72 Hour Product Creation Guide shows you how to build high value products or bonuses one after the other in 72 hours or less. Click Here.

3. How To Outsource Your Product Creation And Make It Hands Free.
Outsourcing the creation of some or all of your products and bonuses is a great way to save your time for the more important (and more fun) things you’d rather be doing. Grab my Hands Free Outsourcing Cheat Sheet to learn more. Click Here.