How Can Businesses Increase Revenues By Outsourcing?

Newer and smarter strategies are always evolving countless opportunities in myriad aspects for businesses today, one of which is definitely outsourcing. Businesses hiring external parties for the completion of their tasks is basically outsourcing!

Companies, big or small, are all up for getting help in research, administration, customer service, etc. to fetch benefits like better operational efficiency or fewer expenses!

Professional teams, offices, students, and self-taught individuals are providing businesses with these services. As per Statista’s survey on technology outsourcing in Canada, the government and businesses have spent around 15 billion Canadian dollars on tech outsourcing in 2020.

Outsourcing is a whole market today where even if individuals and students either don’t have time or are not interested to join offices – can independently work from home, work flexibly, and earn money!

Where on the one hand businesses reap revenue and efficiency benefits by outsourcing, it’s likewise a fabulous way of engaging today’s students (professional individuals and remote specialized office setups) to work remotely and globally, earn experience and exposure.

Students can get paid either via professional freelancing platforms (platforms like Upwork and Freelancer.com – Upwork has a network of freelancers from around 180 countries including Canada) active in Canada or via best student credit cards in Canada! Businesses both within and outside the country can outsource.

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Even if you are a student or are not pursuing a degree at all but possess skills in trend (like copywriting, graphic designing, communication skills, etc.), numerous business outsourcing opportunities are there for you to gross cash and experience!

Now, let’s have a deeper insight into how businesses can benefit from outsourcing in 2021:

How Can Businesses Increase Revenues By Outsourcing?

Organizations prefer outsourcing tasks that would save them money, effort, or provide them with a competitive edge. They may hire on a regular basis for performing regular tasks (like handling budgets or customer service) or on a cyclical basis (filing taxes once a year).

Following are some outsourcing benefits that help businesses boost their revenues:

Operational Control

Some departments of an organization are not as much under-control as others but still, their outcomes are very crucial for the business’s profits. The companies then may decide to outsource contractors to do the job for them in the best way possible.

These external parties provide the organizations with the best project management skills and project outcomes. Resultantly, the internal employees can direct their hard work towards other integral tasks.

Sometimes, outsourcing operations are more budget-friendly than either hiring new employees or training the existing ones!

Cost Benefits

Business expansion may demand new land, new equipment, and new employees – the associated expenses include:

• Property capital
• Property maintenance
• Employee hiring
• Employee healthcare
• Employee management expenses
• Payroll expenses
• Equipment purchasing (it may be a liability if you don’t need it full-time)
• Equipment depreciation costs
• Land and machinery insurance, etc.

Outsourcing contractors can minimize these expenses and would be more skilled in the required tasks.

Whatsapp is a well-known application today. It was not that big when it started with only 35 workers. For expansion, they outsourced development resources from Russia. In comparison with Russia, these resources were quite costly in the US.

Today, Whatsapp is the most popular messaging app with 2 billion users around the world. It is downloadable in 180 countries.

Aids In Business Growth

When a business outsources certain tasks, the jobs thus done save a big amount of time and money which the businesses can invest in purchasing the resources for business expansion!

Businesses need to perform some tasks for the competitive edge and for keeping their customer base engaged. E.g. social media marketing. Businesses can outsource social media experts for creating content, promoting content, and engaging with followers.

This way, your employees can work on other crucial business tasks like production, budgeting, etc.

• One real-life example is Slack, which is a remote communication app like Skype. In the initial days, it had a team of 4. But when they decided to reach a bigger audience, they faced challenges regarding visual aspects for which they outsourced from MetaLab (interface design firm).

Competitive Advantage

While outsourcing can manage the non-core tasks, organizations and it’s employees focus on core tasks and other significant activities like:

• Maintain positions in the marketplace against competitors
• Improvement of in features of existing products
• Lowering the cost of products/ services while maintaining their quality
• Researching for new opportunities (new/ updated services and products) in the marketplace
• Strategic alliances for pooling funds for future business growth

Risk Management And Undisturbed Flow Of Operations

Outsourcing helps prevent businesses from disturbance in the natural flow of operations. This disturbance (potential risks) could be employee turnover, technical crisis, death/ illness of a department manager, natural calamity, etc.

The outsourcer can resume their tasks and ensure their completion in time.

Outsourcing in this scenario is a huge comfort, especially when your competitor is not in the same region or the same situation as yours. The operations face no delay and customers are entertained without any trouble.

Extended Operational Hours

If you have cooperated with third parties in regions with different time zones, your business would have an edge over extended operational hours. These third parties can deliver work when your in-house employees have off-time.

Well, this is a perk for only the organizations which would require extra hours of operation – usually online businesses or the businesses which cater to the customers from different regions!

• It can also be a great substitute for demanding overtime from existent workers. Outsourcing would ensure efficiency and quality maintenance.

A Consistent And Flexible Relation With An Outsourcing Company

As per Deloitte Global Outsourcing Survey 2020, cost reduction is the biggest agenda behind outsourcing external parties.

Hiring the same outsourcing parties whenever needed brings consistency and flexibility to the company’s maneuvers. Even if they are called once or twice a year (e.g. in auditing periods), maintaining a good relationship with them can help create reliability in business operations:

• Polite manner (a trained company manager with fine negotiation and communication skills)
• Paying in time (via credit cards, freelancing platforms, payment apps like PayPal)
• Clarity of hiring objectives (a clear communication of their tasks and company’s expectations)

Hiring Skilled Experts

Your business can decide to hire experienced and skilled specialists for the tasks on which your already-hired employees have limited expertise. Outsourcing is cheaper in the majority of cases and you end up with a professional solution alongside.

On the other hand, this activity engages and lends opportunities to skilled experts (students, self-taught teams) worldwide.

• Alibabais a profound example of outsourcing for skilled experts and doubling their revenues. They had the advantage of low production and manufacturing costs in China but web development skills were extinct.
• So, they outsourced from America and fulfilled their tech deficiency.

Better Customer Service

Hiring professional customer service providers can lead to immense brand exposure and money benefits. In case your business is either entirely online (Amazon store) or catering on-web as well (like food chains e.g. KFC) – customer service outsourcing parties can lend 24/7 customer support.

A business that focuses on good customer service relishes the following paybacks:

Improvement In Internal Staff  – On-site Outsourcing

Sometimes businesses get the projects, some portions of which require the expertise not available in the organization’s internal staff. Consider for example a software company to create a program – and some coding skills are extinct in the company.

On-site outsourcing can allow the outsourced professionals to work with the assistance of your staff and your staff can acquire/ learn the skill during the project.

Be Attentive To Primary Business Activities

The administrative/ back-office work can swell to such an extent that it may take so much of the employee’s time and effort. If such tasks are outsourced, the employees and management can focus on primary business chores like marketing, networking, product research, and development.

Business Functions That Can Be Outsourced

Global Supply Chain

Global outsourcing market size was estimated to be 92.5 billion USD pre-pandemic.

Today, you can get your products batch ready anywhere in the world without being physically present there. E.g. Alibaba app allows you to manufacture products in China (95% of sellers are Chinese) and get them shipped to the USA from where you can sell on Amazon.

Bookkeeping / Accounting

A virtual assistant can perform the following tasks for your company:

• Invoicing
• Accounting
• Credit card reconciliations
• Account payable management
• Account receivables management, etc.

Today, there is online software in which both the VA and company manager can log in and the manager can look over VA’s tasks.

Production

Sometimes quality and price benefits are higher by outsourcing the production to another country with desirable expertise and low labor costs. The quality control team further ensures the looked-for production.

Staffing

Technology allows you to outsource freelancers part-time. You won’t ever be required to meet them in the process.

There are around 1.1 billion freelancers worldwide.

Individuals, professional teams, students are available online on freelancing platforms to complete the tasks at a fraction of the cost than hiring trained employees.

Cloud Computing

The main concern of outsourcing companies to opt cloud technology is security.

46% companies believ that they are outsourcing IT because they don’t have the desired talents while 45% that in-house IT management is pricier.

Cloud services prevent you from hiring local tech staff for your data management. It is cost-effective and efficient.

Outsourcing Tips For Better Decisions

Outsource The Activities Smartly

Businesses need to make these decisions wisely as almost everything can be outsourced in today’s age. Experts advise not to outsource your USP or what is most loved by your customer!

If your staff can perform a duty efficiently and at a low cost, outsourcing isn’t for you.

Compare Costs

You can have dozens of options while outsourcing. You won’t be hunting for the cheapest but the one with the best benefits at the best cost.

Moreover, don’t forget associated costs like legal fees (while contracting with outsourcing parties) and travel expenses.

Interview Cautiously

For you to choose like a pro, you would want to plan what you want (features, plans, deadlines, and attitudes, etc.) exactly. The business is now in a better position to assess whether the external party is the right fit or not.

Objectives Must Be Clear

Outsourcing can be disastrous if there are unsaid and unheard expectations on both sides. Whether it’s about a deadline, or a specific feature in a product – all objectives must be clearly communicated in between.

Note Down The Partnership Dynamics In The Contract

A contract is a summary of expectations, payment amount, payment time, exit strategies, etc. If the service provider is not performing desirably, you are then allowed to terminate the contract if specified in pre-signed documents.

FAQs

What Is Business Outsourcing?

Businesses can hire external parties for manufacturing goods or performing tasks instead of utilizing internal staff.

Is Outsourcing Good Or Bad?

It literally depends! The decision can have the following goods and bads:

Which Companies Do The Most Outsourcing?

Following organizations are doing overseas manufacturing at a big scale:

• Apple
• Nike
• Walmart
• IBM

Is Outsourcing Risky?

Some of the following risks may be present while hiring outsourcing parties (business’s management team can play a significant role here):

• Hidden costs
• Communication obstacles
• Privacy concerns
• Delays
• Compromised quality

How Can Businesses Minimize Risks While Outsourcing?

Hiring experienced parties, constant communication, setting clear objectives, and utilizing appropriate conversing channels can abate the risks.

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