Today we’re going to talk about working smart, and not just hard. I know what you’re thinking: “Oh, no, not another outsourcing post, I’ve read a million of those.” I’m sure you have, but I’m also very sure that a lot of people have no idea how to do it right, even after reading all that information!
Every single time I’m doing a seminar, a workshop, personal coaching or just having a casual marketing conversation with someone, the subject comes up, and even though everybody knows “outsourcing” means that someone in India will do your work way cheaper than someone anywhere else (pretty much), they have no idea how to go about it.
“Oh, I’ve tried that getafreelancer.com, or elance.com, and I’m just not very happy with the results.” Well, dear friends, welcome to my guide for successful outsourcing, and as usual, I’ll give you the WHOLE cookie, instead of a little teaser. There is no pitch to buy an outsourcing e-book or video (well, ok, ahem, you COULD sign up for our private coaching website at ListPlayBook.com, where we’ll go through this and many other things), but other than that, here is how it works, and how I work it.
1. There are a million websites where you can outsource pretty much everything from design, to programming, to blogging and writing, to answering your phone calls or emailing your wife. Some of them specialize in services, and some of them specialize in countries. As this is a beginner’s guide, I do recommend that you try the ones where you don’t have to do too much research about first.
GetAFreeLancer.com
Elance.Com
BestJobs.ph
Or for smaller tasks:
MicroWorkers.com
Mturk.com
ShortTask.com
2. There is no way around it; you’re going to have to go through a couple of bad apples before you find the good ones. Don’t start with big expensive projects, do smaller projects, find people/teams that deliver quality material on time. Just post a project on one of the above websites, and you’ll get tons of quotes!
3. Ask for references! I cannot emphasize enough how important this is. I don’t care if they have a flashy website or portfolio, I want references, and I’m definitely going to contact them. I’m rigorous when I hire people, I’ll make international calls just to verify and to have a chat with references. I’m a marketer, damn it, I can make anything look premium, high quality and make you drool over it, even if it’s just a bogus product. Don’t try me on that.
4. Also, when you use f.ex. eLance.com, they offer an escrow service, where you deposit money, but they won’t get it until you approve the material they deliver. This adds security. Don’t EVER pay anyone you haven’t done business with multiple times without going through an established escrow (not one that they provide for you). The Internet is full of scammers, don’t make it easy for them.
So, how did I get started? Where’s the cookie I promised? Here we go:
First of all, I’ll let you know I am no programmer. I know some basic HTML, some basic Photoshop, and that’s about it. But… I know how to sell. Back in the day, I started doing websites, blogs and some simple programming for people. I charged someone $1000 for a website, and paid someone else $400 to create it. The first couple of times I pocketed $600-$1500 for sending a couple of emails, I was happy and motivated.
Not before long, I started offering full web services (alongside the marketing services I was offering), programming backend systems, CRM-solutions, CMS-platforms etc. All I did was charge more, pay my team in India, and pocket even more money. I could make $5000 off of a website, and all I did was send a few emails between my client and my team.
Other things I tried was selling articles. I paid someone $4 per article, and then I sold them for $6 or $7. With 20-40 articles sold per day, that’s a VERY easy $100+ a day, with about 5 minutes of work.
Then I found some ghost writers that wrote an e-book for me. That cost me $250, and the total sales reached over $6000 dollars (this was back in the day when MySpace marketing was something new). Took me probably a day or two all in all. Where are you making $6000 for two days work?
Pay people to social bookmark for you, to post comments on blogs for you, to post in forums for you, but don’t get all stupid and think that you can pay people to click your Adsense links or fill out your CPA offers, that kind of stupid stunt will get you banned, and frankly…who cares about the nickels and dimes in that anyway?
As you can see, with no knowledge at all, you can offer products and services, make good money, work less, and find more time for more ventures (or that lonely spouse).
The next question I get is usually “but how do I find those customers?”. Well, stay tuned, same blog, same RSS-feed, same place… The answer is coming up!
Sam, enjoyable post. I have hired a writer, a designer and a programmer and have had mixed results. Like you said, it comes down to finding the right people.
Once you can do that, you can probably rely on them for your next project.
It’s funny with the timing, because I’m looking for a programmer/designer for my current project.
Thanks for the info Sam. I’m actually looking at getting into ghostwriting and was looking to outsource it as well. I have someone that is a college grad and good writer just dying for work. My goal is to build up the business a little then sell it on flippa.
I’ve used and had success with rentacoder.com
You can get some really cheap work done on that site. I’ve tried projects including windows gui apps, console apps, php projects, and artwork.
Odesk.com is another one. They have a pretty decent solution that takes screenshots of the coder/provider’s desktop. But I haven’t used them much.
Nice concise post on outsourcing. Any tips on dealing with the below?
1) How do you know the outsources are not sending you viruses or putting malicious code into the websites they make for you? Some things are fairly safe but when you get into site design and programming there’s all kinds of exploits/tracking they can be putting in. Is there an easy way for a newb to look out for this stuff? Do we also need to worry about them sending viruses along with basic docs, images, excel files?
Most prob want to keep us customers happy but I’m sure some would love to be able to send some malicious spy programs to see how we use their work to make our money.
2) Dealing with sending 1099s to US based outsourcers, if you pay them over $600 in a year, you need to send one. Most US outsources don’t want to fill out the W-9 and provide us with their SS #. Other than not hiring US workers; have you found an easy way around this?
3) Do you always make the outsourcers send you an invoice? I know most of us just ship the money via paypal all over the world. I just worry the tax man might want more documentation then a paypal transaction showing funds were sent to Joe citizen in india. Could look like dumping money to claim expenses.
I’m thinking an invoice would look more official. Any thoughts on this issue?
Thanks
Tim, great questions!
1. If you use those sites, you can check reviews from other customers, and I suggest you start working with people/companies/teams that have tons of great reviews and not single individuals with no reviews. There are of course no guarantees, but if you’re really paranoid, let someone do the programming for cheap, then have someone in your country (who you can legally and easily sue) do a check, and pay them for it. Of course, don’t ever use your computer without an anti-virus program installed! And check references!!! Don’t just trust what they say, call, email, instant message AT LEAST three references, preferably the ones in your own country if they have any.
2. If they don’t want to send a W9, I won’t work with them. That is completely unprofessional. If they don’t want to reveal their SS#, they can easily and quickly get an EIN from the IRS website. It takes 5 minutes.
3. Yes, of course you need an invoice! You can, in most cases, print this from the mentioned websites as well. Or just ask them to email you one separately.
Well, I’m not an accountant, but if you have an invoice with a price and a service listed, and you can show that the service was provided (scripts, software, documents), I don’t see why there should be a problem.
Hope this helps!
Sam