Outsourcing is when you delegate a task or job to another person or company. There are many reasons why you might want to outsource a task. Usually, it is because you want to free up some time for yourself. If you find yourself with too much on your plate, hiring someone or delegating can be a great way to lighten the load.
What are some areas in your business that can be outsourced?
Some common tasks that people consider for outsourcing are things like bookkeeping, accounting, website design, and social media management. Here are some of the tasks that you can consider delegating for your business.
1. Graphic design – One of the tasks that you can hire for your business is graphic design. If art or design is not your main skill and if you find yourself spending a lot of time creating print flyers, you definitely need to hire someone to do this.
As Patrick Lencioni says, “It’s your zone of genius, that’s where your gift is really meant to be given to other people. Don’t focus on cultivating gifts that don’t belong inside of who you are.”
2. Website management and maintenance – If you’re tired of updating your website, and doing the same thing on a weekly or monthly basis, you can find a web design agency or a website professional that can take care of all the repetitive tasks that you do to maintain your website. They can do all the necessary updates, publish content and blog posts, and even troubleshoot errors and issues.
3. Social media management – Spending a lot of time on social media is not productive at all. It can result in great ROI but, sometimes it feels like you’re sending things out into the wind. However, you know that it’s important and it’s imperative that you have a strong social media presence.
To ensure you maximize your use of social media and make sure it benefits your business, the best direction to take is outsourcing your social media management. Have someone who will look after your social media and manage your online presence. So you won’t have to deal with it with yourself and get distracted by everything you see on social media.
4. Copywriting – Another thing that you can outsource is copywriting. Yes, you can write amazing copy for your sales pages, your website, and your flyers. No one knows your business and target market better than you, so you are the best person to do this. But there are also professional copywriters out there that are trained and expertly knowledgeable in delivering your message through newsletters, blog posts, social media content, and more. They know how to tell your story in a powerful way.
How to decide which tasks to consider for outsourcing?
The best way to identify which tasks to delegate is for you to make a list of things you spend most of your time on. After you finish the list, mark each item in the list if they are inside your “Zone of Genius” or not. If it isn’t something you excel at and enjoy doing, it should be delegated and removed from your to-do list. Use a ‘Z’ to mark “Zone of Genius,” and an ‘N’ to mark if it isn’t something you should continue.
Pick out those items in your list that you marked with ‘N’ and that takes the majority of your time. These are the things that you can outsource to an external team. Delegating these to another person or agency removes this from your daily responsibilities and frees up time for you to spend on other aspects of your business.
You can never have enough time. It’s the one thing that you can never get back. But it can be renewed every single day and it’s up to you to spend it in an incredible and valuable way.
Now, go forward and outsource, so you can grow and buy your time back.
