The Difference That Outsourcing Makes In A Small Business
A main goal for many small businesses is growth. Growth to a small business is everything. Growth leads to more customers, more profit, the ability to expand and offers stability for a business. While growth is what is strived for, it takes time and resources that not all small businesses have. This is when outsourcing comes into play.
Outsourcing certain services allows small businesses to access experts with specialized knowledge and skills without committing to hiring in-house. This is beneficial because small businesses do not always can access these services without outsourcing and some services are typically even accessible only to larger organizations because of the cost commitment. There are numerous services that can be outsourced such as human resources, shipping, logistics, and research but there are six that can truly be effective for a small business’ future success.
1. Accounting
Accounting is a commonly outsourced area in small businesses, while finances are an important part of business – not everyone is a finance expert. While small businesses have less income to spend, outsourcing an accountant can help manage this aspect of a business while saving money and time. Bringing in a skilled expert in accounting to a small business can improve efficiency and reduce financial mistakes, saving them time and trouble overall. They can also take on tasks such as bookkeeping, payroll processes, tax accounting, reporting, and budgeting.
2. Human Resources
HR plays a critical role in protecting business from legal issues, high turnover rates, compliance risks, and bad hiring practices. Beyond helping the overall business, HR can provide proper employee management by protecting employees from workplace misconduct and toxic work environments (sexual harassment, bullying, discrimination, etc.). HR is a huge role in both start-up and established businesses but not all can afford to manage this in-house, this is when to look at outsourcing. Outsourcing HR tasks such as payroll processing, employee benefits administration, talent acquisition, employee law compliance and risk management can save a business time, money and give them the ability to properly tend to their employees to help drive overall business results.
3. Marketing
When looking to expand your business, marketing becomes a front runner to achieve this. While it takes a substantial amount of time and money to pull together an efficient marketing team, outsourcing can bring you this service without sacrificing a huge portion of your profit giving your business every chance to grow. An outsourced marketing team will have the skill to take over with ad design, web design, content creation, social media, campaigns, and branding. Marketing for a business is reported to take up to 33 hours per week to achieve results, bringing an outsourced team will allow your in-house staff to dedicate their time and focus on other important business aspects.
4. Customer Service
Outsourcing customer services resources is beneficial if a business deals with customers over the phone or online. A business can outsource to call centers or freelance customer service representatives for over the phone needs and to chat services for online. It is important to remember that to set up a seamless outsourced customer service experience be sure to have processes, workflows, and resources in place for the third-party handling your customers.
5. IT Services
IT Services are critical to a business but setting aside time and money to train and maintain an in-house time can be too costly for a small business to properly execute. Currently IT services are one of the largest outsourced industries. Outsourcing IT allows SMBs to access the knowledge to properly run this aspect of their business. They can take over tasks such as building cloud infrastructure, installing, and maintaining computer software, maintaining hardware, improving network security, complete network maintenance, offer troubleshoot support and offer guaranteed system and file backups. Having access to these services as a SMB can make a world of difference in their growth and stability subsequently.
6. Manufacturing
Outsourcing manufacturing is essential to small businesses because setting up a dedicated manufacturing facility is extremely costly because of factors such as space, product, and labor. When choosing to outsource to an already established manufacturer a business can save money in production, labor, and overhead costs. If a business experiences a sudden surge in orders, they also have no issues accommodating to these demands, if there is a decrease in demands there is not the risk of a huge economic loss.
7. Administrative Tasks
Administrative tasks that help keep a business organized such as making appointments, handling office coordination, creating travel itineraries, following up with appointments and answering the phone can sometimes be neglected when you have less employees to split time between. This is when outsourcing an administrative person or hiring a virtual assistant would be necessary. While these tasks are mundane, they help with day-to-day business. Commonly this aspect of business is overseen in house but with the increase in both communication and collaboration tools it is completely achievable to be managed remotely.
Outsourcing services bring other incredible potential to a small, growing business. Small businesses can increase overall company efficiency, scalability, reduce financial risks, and level the playing field with bigger organizations. In addition to these, there are four stand out benefits:
Access To Skill and Knowledge
Small businesses are usually staffed with core in-house staff who oversee the basic business needs. This means sometimes there might not be qualified to manage finances, accounting, marketing, or IT services. Outsourcing allows SMBs to access multiple skill sets and experts in different industries who can help a business thrive without completely sacrificing the bottom line. Whether you need short-term or long-term, the access to this knowledge during critical growth years proves incredibly beneficial for the success of a business.
Investing In Other Areas Of Growth
Outsourcing services can allow owners and in-house staff to focus on accomplishing the core objectives of their business. Not only that but since a business is spending less time on payroll with outsourcing, they could dedicate funds elsewhere, this allows growth through every area of a business. Robust growth throughout the whole business means a more financially secure future.
Improve Business Continuity
Running a business is not going to be a smooth path, business owners are aware that trends and industries rapidly change, and unforeseen events can derail operations overnight. By having the knowledge and skills with third parties, small businesses can mitigate this risk, helping business not miss a step regardless of any unpredicted circumstances.
Healthy Work Life Balance
Mental health in the workplace is becoming increasingly important. While small businesses have limited staff who usually just shoulder more responsibility at the beginning, outsourcing can relieve multiple aspects of business off other employees. Starting small businesses usually means a lot of work and a lot of time. By lessening the tasks and responsibilities of in-house staff members, outsourcing helps create a healthy workplace and workplace relationships during critical periods of growth.
Now outsourcing is great for a business if services are outsourced properly. Outsourcing the wrong tasks that do not need special attention can end up being a waste of time and money, accurately assessing which aspects of a business that can benefit from an outsourced expert can avoid this.
Without a doubt, the business world is competitive and those who can stay on top of every aspect of their business have the advantage. Outsourcing is a wonderful way to drastically improve a small business’ chances of maintaining a competitive edge, freeing up time and dedicating resources properly.
