When it comes to your business, there’s usually something (or too many things shall I say?) that you can outsource. Let’s face it, you and I both know that Richard Branson wouldn’t be sitting in front of his desk answering emails, writing content and editing videos. He’s probably at Necker Island thinking of the next big idea. So as a business owner, why should you? There are a lot of repetitive tasks out there that it would be very easy to find someone else to do for you, and it would free you up so that you can concentrate on the more important – and more interesting –aspects of your business. Let’s take a look at six different categories of tasks that you might want to outsource along with some specific tasks that you can get someone to do for you – and some reasons why it might be preferable to outsource the task instead of doing it yourself.
Website Tasks
The first category that we’ll be looking at is website tasks. These are things related to your website that you can outsource; tasks that you normally do yourself (and sometimes forget to do) but that can be easily done by someone else. 1.Updating plug-ins: One of the tasks that you can outsource is getting someone to update your WordPress plugins that need regular updates and make sure that they are configured properly. 2.Backup Website: Your website should be backed up regularly, and sometimes this can be a time-consuming task. Luckily, it is also is something that can easily be outsourced. 3.Moderating Comments: Moderating comments can be extremely time-consuming, but unless you get rid of spam and negative comments, no one can have a legitimate discussion. 4.Setting Up Autoresponders: Your helper can set up an autoresponder that will reply to people when the email as well as the content that goes with it. 5.Write Blog Posts: Getting someone to write short blog posts that keep your site updated regularly is important. These do not to be anything special like a pro writer would create, but they should be posted regularly. 6.Find The Perfect Image for Blog Posts: The perfect image is sometimes just as important as the content. If you have outsourced a professional article to a writer, you might want to get someone to find the perfect image to go with it. 7.Creating Forms: Your website needs forms, and creating them can be a pain especially if there are a lot of fields to worry about. 8.Managing Website Advertising: Whether you are offering advertising on your own website or looking for advertising on other websites, outsourcing this task can have big benefits. 9.Researching Affiliate Products: If you are in the affiliate marketing business, then you always want to know about good products to promote. 10.Creating Infographics: Infographics are terrific ways to pass on information and can sometimes get shared to the point where they are almost viral. 11.Install/Customize WordPress Themes: Sometimes, a new WordPress theme is all you need to make your site look brand-new. 12.Adding Ecommerce Products: If you have an e-commerce website, then adding products is repetitive tasks that you can get someone else to do.
Office Work
There are also quite a few office tasks that you can outsource. For larger companies where there is a huge need for these services, there is usually an entire department dedicated to them. But for the small business or the online entrepreneur who just needs these tasks taken care of far less often, but still regularly, outsourcing can be the perfect solution. 13.Customer Support: Customer support is an important part of any business, and handling yourself takes way too much time. 14.Following up on Leads: When you get a lead, you still need to qualify it and get the appointment. 15.Harvesting Leads: You also need to get the leads in the first place. That’s why outsourcing harvesting leads can make a whole lot of sense for businesses. 16.Creating Basic Reports: Sometimes, a report on various aspects of your business can give you more clarity and help you make better decisions. 17.Be Available for Live Chats: If you have a live chat link on your website, then you need someone to be available for 18.Building Databases or Data Entry: Data entry is an extremely boring and repetitive tasks, but some people excel at it. 19.Monitor Business Image in Search Engines: You should check Google and other search engines regulated make sure the your images being properly maintained 20.Managing Spam Emails: Spam is a problem for everyone, but you need a human to get rid of spam that the spam filters do not catch 21.Sending Invoices: Getting invoices your customers is a basic part of doing business 22.Basic Bookkeeping: Doing basic bookkeeping means mostly data entry for financial items. 23.Tracking Deadlines: When you have multiple deadlines it can be hard to keep track of them all 24.Transcribing: Taking audio files or handwritten information and transcribing it is a good task to outsource.
Personal Assistance
Having a personal assistant can be pretty amazing. But these days, you don’t actually have to hire a full-time assistant. Instead, you can hire a virtual assistant to help you with some of the things that you have to do daily or weekly to free up your time for someone else. Here are a few ideas of things that you might farm out to a virtual assistant. 25.Making Appointments: One of the best ways to utilize a personal assistance to get them to make your appointments for you. 26.Research: If you need research for a particular project, a personal assistant can scour the web and other resources to get you the info you need. 27.Event Management: When you have an event coming up, planning for it can be time-consuming; but a personal assistant can help. 28.Online Shopping/Comparisons: Buying stuff online is extremely convenient, but you can save money and get better products if you do your research. Getting an assistant to them can be even better. 29.Sending Thank You Messages: Something that can build relationships is sending thank you messages. 30.Answering Emails: Your emails may be too numerous for you to manage yourself, and that’s where personal assistant comes in. 31.Making Reservations and Confirmations: Making reservations and confirming them is something you can outsource. 32.Managing Your Calendar: When you have someone managing your calendar, it is much less likely that you will be late for anything. 33.Running Social Media Contests: If you are holding a social media contests, getting an assistant to run it makes a lot of sense.
Search Engine Optimization
One of the most important things to an online business is search engine optimization. But lots of those SEO tasks are pretty boring and repetitive and can be done by someone else. Let’s look at some ways that you can shift the burden and toil that comes with SEO to someone else. 34.Reporting of Website Analytics: Creating reports of basic analytics information is something you can outsource. 35.Research Keywords: This is one of the most time-consuming and repetitive tasks out there. 36.Comment on Blogs/Link Building: Link building can increase your authority and make you rank higher. 37.Create Forum Posts and Threads: When you create a forum posts, you can often put a link in the signature that leads back to your site. 38.Regular Site Analysis: Checking your site to make sure loads fast and everything is good is something that needs to be done regularly. 39.Checking Out Competing Pages: Seeing what the competition is doing is important. 40.Coming Up With SEO Strategies: You are always on the lookout for new Seo strategies and an assistant can help you find them. 41.Adding Tags to Images & Posts: If you have posts or images that do not have tags, then get someone to do them for you. 42.Internal Linking: Your site should definitely have internal linking, although you may be able to install a plug-in for this.
Professional Services
There are lots of professional service providers on the internet, and most are willing to work for really low rates. When you need something written, designed or coded, consider outsourcing to a professional service provider. Here are some of the regular tasks that you can farm out to someone else to give you more free time with your business. 43.Writing Product Descriptions: Writing product descriptions must be done regularly. Finding someone to write them for you can mean better product descriptions. 44.Digital Presentations/Slideshows: Creating presentations and slideshows is something you can outsource. 45.Graphic Design: Finding a graphic designer when you need one can be difficult, so it is easier just to have one that you outsource work to 46.Programming: When you need something coded, you can often find a freelancer for it. This might be part of your website or your mobile app or something else entirely. 47.Video Editing: If you have videos that need editing, you can definitely outsource this. 48.Project Manage: Your VA could manage and coordinate current and upcoming projects for you such as product launches or a new website. 49.Book Layout & Formatting: That same person can do layouts and formatting if you plan on publishing yourself. 50.Editing and Producing Audio Files like Commercials: Audio production is something that requires talent such as finding the right music for a commercial.
Social Media Tasks
Social media is an important part of business these days, but it can be difficult to keep up with your social media accounts, keep people engaged and ensure that your followers are growing. That’s why we have come up with some ways that you can automate social media tasks via a real person and still maintain the same quality social media postings as you normally do. 51.Post a Quote to Instagram: You definitely want to keep people on Instagram engaged, and that means making regular posts. If you can hire someone to find a great quote to post, and makes your job easier 52.Moderate Facebook Groups: Moderating Facebook groups can be a great way to communicate with your fans and promote your business. 53.Reply to Relevant Tweets: Making replies to relevant tweets can get you more followers on twitter. If you can scour the twitter sphere for replies that have to do with your business or your product, and then replied to them, people will follow those replies back to your profile. 54.Post Marketing Messages: Posting marketing messages should be done sell them on social media, but they still need to be done regularly. This is something you can outsource 55.Produce & Post Regular YouTube Content: You should be posting regular content on YouTube, and if you do not have time then you may need to outsource it. 56.Respond to YouTube Comments: When people make YouTube comments, they are looking to engage with your company or brand. Getting someone to respond to those YouTube comments is a great way to get subscribers and viewers. 57.Participating in Trending Conversations: On Twitter and Facebook, there are trending conversations in hashtags that you should be taking advantage of to get more followers. 58.Performing Social Bookmarking: Making sure that you’re doing social bookmarking is an important part of building links.
The Bottom Line
There are lots of different tasks that you can outsource, and often you get a much better result than if you were to do it yourself. There are plenty of people out there willing to do the work. Some of them are even really skilled at it. If you are still lacking for ideas, here are a few more to consider. 59.Finding Amazon Niches 60.Managing Guest Posting 61.Find and cite sources for your articles 62.Gathering feedback from customers about your products or services 63.Creating Pins on Pinterest 64.Posting on Reddit 65.Engaging on Quora by upvoting and posting answers to questions 66.Register Business in Directory Listings 67.Manage Pay-Per-Click Campaigns 68.Do Networking on LinkedIn 69.Research Legal Requirements for Forms or Business Practices 70.Create stationery requirements such as business cards, letterheads, flyers, brochures. If you’re looking to start outsourcing your business and start working smarter, book in a free 30-minute consultation with us.
