Outsource Your Life and Business

The outsourcing trend has created quite the buzz around a concept that many still don't quite understand. What is outsourcing and why, as an entrepreneur should I be doing it?

Outsourcing, whether local or foreign is a growing business model for many businesses both large and small. Understanding what concept will help you gain insight on what it can do for you.

Answering your WHY statement is the most important thing you can do before getting started with outsourcing your tasks.

What pain points do you have in your business or in your life? Solving your WHY will help you determine the reason you must take action soon.

There was a time where I tried to become really good at everything because I liked the control. I got burned out. I like to know just a little about everything, just enough to where I can hire the right people to fill those roles.

Ask yourself, Is there a quicker, more effective method to handle processes?

Outsourcing give your the option to:

1. Find incredible talent
2. Focus on your core business
3. Get to market quicker
4. Better use your core competencies

Outsourcing means that you’re giving up something and paying for someone else to do the task on your behalf. This cost needs to make sense financially so that you’re able to scale your business.

Action item: The first step is determining what is your time really worth?

When you think about the basic outsourcing tasks for your business the first things that might come to mind are usually software development, financial services, data entry and creative or development services.

But the reality of outsourcing is that you can use it for many other things. When you think about all of the areas that you would like help in, you tend to make a big list. So how do we start?

After completing this exercise you will know what types of tasks you should start outsourcing.

Action Item: Write down 3-5 Tasks that You Love!

When you’re jotting down tasks, write down what tasks do you do repetitively? Repetitive tasks might include checking email, importing v-cards, editing web pages, checking voicemail and so on. Want to see a HUGE list of things to outsource, check out our attached doc (I show you 220+ potential things to outsource).

What tasks could someone do equal or better than you on? I say better than you because you want these tasks to not disappear from your life, but just off your plate.

The goal of this exercise will be to determine your actual list of tasks that you can hand off to someone else.

Action Item: Make a list of everything that you do in a given day that you want to remove off your plate.

Next to the task, think about how much time it it takes to accomplish that task.

Give it a number per day (5 for 5 minutes, 120 for two hours and so on.) Get ready to be shocked by the amount of time you’re potentially loosing each day.

Action Item: Go down your list and give each task a time amount in minutes.

Knowing what category your task falls under is a great exercise because it helps us identify what skills we need out of our hire.

Action item: Go down you list and assign a category to each task.

I've included a download of what my list looks like after I've organized my list.

"The role of leadership is to transform the complex situation into small pieces and prioritize them" - Carlos Ghosn

You've just created a list that is all chaos! Time to get organized :) I want you to give each task a # from 1-3 depending on how important that tasks is for you. So use the space on the far right to give the task a priority.

In this module, you will prioritize your list of tasks and develop a plan of attack.

Action item: Go down your list and assign a number 1-3 to each task depending on their priority.

Your Top 10 list is the most reasonable approach to take at your outsourcing list.

Simplifying your list to just 10 tasks will help you learn the exercise so that in the future you can grow this list to as many tasks that you want to outsource.

Action item: Add up the total number of time you spend in your Top 10 List. Then multiply it by your hourly rate.

Determine what it will take hourly or project based to successfully complete a task or project. In order to do this you’ll need to think through each part of your job.

You can break it down into three different areas of projects:

1. Hiring ongoing help
2. Hiring a project freelancer or firm
3. Hiring to cover what you’ve been hired to do

It’s important to now include the “when” to this equation.

What I like to say is, you know you’re ready when you want your personnel to concentrate on their core competencies. Or if it’s for you personally, I would say “When you reach the point of repetitive work that you can easily build a process for then you must begin to outsource."

Choose a Platform (Odesk is going to be my Example) Many of the other sites (such as elance.com) have a similar style of features, and I’ve made a list of sites that you can use for outsourcing your work (attached). Once you feel comfortable using Odesk types of sites you can start using websites like BestHire.ph for more permanent solutions…(there are also drawbacks to this)

Post Job

Choose Category

They are pretty close at matching categories for your project. You sometimes have to look around but they’re usually logically laid out.

Job a Title

Describe the work to be done - I’ve included a template for a VA. The more descriptive, the better changes of finding the right person for your job.

**ULTIMATE HACK** The ultimate hack is to put a secret phrase in the description to make sure that your contractors read through the entire document. Sometime I’ll have them answer 3 questions or else you won’t even consider them. I also sometimes create an alias for them to address me by calling me Santa or by Mr. J and I’ll put it at the end or in the middle. If they don’t start by following directions, don’t let them in the circle.

Duration (this is important because it can potential build in some negotiation if you’re going to use them long term and it will give others the idea that this is a one off job that they don’t need to quit their day job to do)

• Quick Job (one off data entry)

• Project (website 1-2 months)

• Long-term relationship (Virtual Assistant 6 months)

Location of contractor ( Many people think that certain areas are better for certain jobs. I’ve yet to be able to prove that because every time I try I’m amazed by the results. India used to be really good for code but not for design. Don’t hire indians for data entry, instead hire in the Philippines and hire Romanians for design work and europeans for PPC and Adsense skills. I’ve hired in over 10 countries (list here) and I’ve documented my experience with each of them. Don’t just think that outsourcing means overseas. I very rarely hire writing work out site of the US, because i’ve spent years finding the right writers for many projects and found the most success in the US (California to be specific)

Interviewing your prospects can be one of the most time consuming things you'll do. Use these tips to eliminate hours of extra time that you could be spending on this process.

Here are a few to mention:

Ask the right questions - Make sure you check out my list of questions that you can ask your contractor during the interview process. Treat this as if you’re hiring someone to work in your office…because it’s the same level of attention.

Get their personalities out - If you’re working with these people more than a few days, then you’re going to want to enjoy working with them. So you need to know if your personalities work.

Hold a audio/video meeting via Skype or Google Hangout. Make sure they can communicate well. The last thing you want is someone who is doing your guest blog outreach plan to not be able to talk.

Test internet speed - During your interview in the last point you can ask them what type of computer they use, what their internet speed it (use speedtest.com). Ask them to screenshare with you and have them run a speedtest. This will immediately reduce the # of applicants (which is the goal).

Depending on the role you’re trying to fill, this will determine which route you should take when hiring.

When you’re considering all of the different types of talent in the world, you’ll run into two different scenarios. Either a Company that has the resources you’re looking for or an Individual.

You then need to consider the following:

• • Company or Individual
• • Specialized or Broad

see that there are two types of people or talent you will hire. I put them in the category of trained and not train ed. I’ve determined that this is the biggest difference between all of the talent pool out there.

So you’ve got two different types:

Quality with Training - You can bargain and find talent if you’re willing to put in the work. But get ready to work a little to find the right one and to do a bunch of training. This is sometimes the best route if you want to fine the diamond in the rough and mold them to fit well for your future projects.

Quality without training - More money since they will already be trained to do what you’re asking them to do with minor or no training. There are people out there that will help you systemize your business. They need you to explain what you’re trying to do and then they’ll go and create systems for your business.

As mentioned before in this module, you need to understand that you’re not always going to be your contractors #1 priority unless you can keep them busy the majority of their time.

Many people in certain areas will work 18 hour days so that they can earn a living at $4-5 per hour. This can be dangerous to your business if they start to slack off or become hard to get in touch with.

You need to have a conversation with them and setup certain parameters when you first set the expectations.

Tracking your team early on will lead to the success of your on-boarding. They’ll end up being more effective because they know every move is being monitored by you.

There are tools out there like WorkSnaps and TimeDoctor that work great. You can find a link to the right. If I choose to use a tool like this outside of odes or another large site, I’m fully transparent why I want to track them and I make it a reward the day I no longer have to use it. But they must earn it first.

Using the "Big sites" like Upwork and Freelancer have their perk but it comes at a small price. You can take advantage of many of their features like; time tracking, payment management, etc. But you will be paying up to 10% for all of the features.

If you’re paying through one of the major players like Upwork or Codeable.io, then you will have the option to put your funds in Escrow and release them based on the work that the contractor has provided. This is the safest option and the most attractive one for the contractor.

Paypal or Venmo are other options if you’re working with them directly. These services are easy to setup (basically you just link them to your bank account) and you can trust that your money is safe. Just make sure you set expectations as to how the work will be done and when you’ll pay them.

The most important aspect of this entire hiring and on boarding process is the training. This really goes for any employee whether they are in your office or located over in the Philippines.

"If you expect nothing from anybody, you’re never disappointed."

Early on you need to set expectations with your team. This will not only promote clear goals but it will give you a chance to set the tone for the relationship.

I start by scheduling a meeting with my team on an ongoing basis.

For you this might be daily or weekly (i wouldn’t go much further out than a week though) - Finding a time or times to meet is one of the most important things to establish in the beginning. If there’re overseas then it’s even more important to establish a time to talk since they will need to coordinate with you on times that work. Personally, I meet every morning at 7am with my VA on weekdays.

We’ve already covered technology to use for communication so note you need to choose the style in which you’re going to communicate with your team.

Many times this will come down to a few variables. Those variables are: time of day, type of job, language barrier, size of team, level of involvement and so on.

The main areas to focus communication on are:

• Email

• Chat

• Project Management

Management thinker Peter Drucker is often quoted as saying that "you can't manage what you can't measure."

In every part of your business you have metrics to track to measure the effectiveness of whatever it might be. It’s no different with an employee or contractor. You need to ensure that you’re spending dollars well throughout the entire relationship.

Here are some examples:

Social Media Manager: You would track engagement, amount of followers, comments on posts/tweets/pins, etc.

Data Entry Position: Quality of data entry, speed at which they’re performing, accuracy of input.

For a Marketing campaign: Amount of leads generated, amount of money spent vs earned (ROI), impressions on brand website.

A Virtual Assistant should have certain metrics depending on they types of tasks you have them do: Number of contacts updated/added/removed from database on a daily basis, emails answered, projects completed monthly, response time to web related research.

As we dive deeper into the training module, it’s time to actually look at training techniques. Below is a system that I’ve found to work flawlessly and increase my training time by 60%.

I walk you through my 4 Step Process to become efficient with training your team.

Step 1: Send Process to Team

Step 2: They Film You Completing Tasks

Step 3: They Ask Questions for Clarification

Step 4: You Film Them Doing the Tasks

The entire objective of this course is to get you to buy back valuable time that you’re loosing by handing your tasks off to someone else. The only way to know if this is working for you is to take a look at the numbers.

In this module you'll ask yourself; Could they be doing more or less? Did you just pay someone to do something that cost you more than it was worth?

You want this relationship to work, trust me. You will have just spent a bunch of time finding and training them and the last thing you want to do is start all over. What I do early on is a trial period.

Trial Period - This give you an excuse to keep them on a super short leash during the evaluation period and it allows you to see their potential or lack there of.

If it’s time to let the person go, here is the method I choose to take. In the beginning, tell them that you have a strict 3 strike rule in which you have no other choice but to fire them if they hit 3 strikes in a certain time frame. This ultimately does two things:

1. They know what NOT to do and they’ll work hard to not get a strike and

2. It give you a clear out since you previously set the expectations. Firing someone is never fun but if you hire enough virtual team member, it may eventually happen.

Don’t keep telling yourself you’ll outsource or hire a VA next year. I did this for years before I pulled the trigger and I wish I would have started long before. Start now and start receiving the benefits now. I always wish I would have done things when I originally said I would.

You tell yourself what you’re going to do and only you can keep yourself accountable for those things. If you’re considering it, and still have questions, make sure you shoot an email to john@johnpriceonline.com

I'll walk you through my favorite documentation tool called Clarify.

Watch how to use Xmind to build out your processes and systems to quickly grow your outsourcing team and business.

Sharing and remembering your passwords can be a job of its own. I walk through how you can use LastPass to simplify your life.

Now you can keep your team on track to accomplish their tasks while they keep you in the loop. I show you a free tool called Asana and how it works in my ecommerce business.

When my Virtual Assistant sends me their invoice, I have them follow a procedure using email, worksnaps and paypal.

In this module, we'll walkthrough the entire process of posting a job on Odesk so that you have the tools to post the right job description on the first try.

I got on the phone with the CEO of Odesk and asked him some questions I've been thinking of as an entrepreneur that is outsourcing. Lot's of good insights and facts about Odesk.

This is an example of a virtual assistant job posting that I've used when hiring a virtual assistant. It's a template that you can use too when you start hiring your virtual team.

Check out big list of tasks that you can start outsourcing today! Fully utilized, this list can save you move than 160 hours a month!