At times, you are just better off outsourcing. Sometimes you come across a task, such as building a website, which utterly defeats you, no matter how hard you try. You end up wasting hours of effort trying to get it to work, but no matter what you attempt, that banner image just won't move a few pixels to the left.
As entrepreneurs, we tend to be control freaks. The mantra "if you want something done right, you must do it yourself" is all but ingrained in our minds. We hate the idea of letting a stranger's hands touch our precious project.
But there are times where you just have to get someone else to do it for you. In the case of online marketing and website design, this can be cheap to do, and it can save you hours of stress and frustration.
As an example, I recently launched a personal blog. I had certain ideas for what I wanted to see in my blog, but try as I might, I just couldn't get those ideas to work.
I spent hours trying to figure out how to make a minor tweak but couldn't pull it off. Eventually, I had to settle for something different. Ironically, I ended up going with the default theme that came with the blog, so I wasted a whole day of work and had nothing to show for it.
I have no doubt that a theme designer could have made the change I wanted in no time at all. I would have gotten that much closer to my goal of launching and would have done it far faster than if I had gone at it by myself.
Outsourcing also would have had the advantage of getting someone else involved in the launch. When you go at something all by yourself, it can be hard and lonely. Having an expert on hand will not only speed up the process, but it will also make it more enjoyable.
We hire employees for brick-and-mortar stores because it would be impossible for us to handle everything by ourselves. The same is true for online businesses. You have to deal with customer service, build and maintain a website, manage your marketing efforts, ensure that your business is legally compliant and so on.
Quite honestly, it can be overwhelming.
When it comes to Internet-based tasks, websites such as elance.com provide a useful service that connects freelance workers with employers.
If you're having a hard time building a website or need to outsource content creation, post an ad for your job on elance.com so freelancers can bid on it.
Or you can search for available freelancers offering to work on projects and bid on their offers.
Outsourcing tedious tasks or aspects of your business that you're not good at or simply do not enjoy can work wonders for you.
It will save you a lot of time, enable you to focus your efforts on the parts of your business that actually make you money and leave you more time to spend with your family.
Joshua Rigley is an online business consultant living in Layton. He can be contacted at joshuarigley@gmail.com. or his blog at www.joshuarigley.com.
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