How to Scale a Service Business With Outsourcing
Starting any business takes time, some capital, and often a lot more effort than you’d think. Starting and scaling a service-based business and taking it to the next level can be particularly tricky unless done right. You don’t always have to work harder, just smarter. One way to take some of the weight off and improve productivity is by outsourcing work.
Too many start up service businesses try to scale and then crash as they don’t strategically do it and they jump the gun and try to do it too fast. The Small Business Administration estimates that only 51% of businesses last past five years.
Services boils down to just exchanging time for money, With most services companies maxing out at a few dozen people, business owners are still able to have personal relationships with their team and monitor performance as well as quality on an individual basis. Often these companies have a few experts and more junior people that learn through hands-on experience gained by working with the others over time.
Many of these businesses are trying to figure out how to survive and make ends meet, little known scale and become one of the top players in their area. One of the ways they could really scale is through outsourcing.
Outsourcing has been around for decades, but it’s more recently becoming more popular. Some are still hesitant to try it, but it has been proven time and again by thousands of business owners who have been outsourcing for years that this has helped them quickly grow their business.
Fun facts:
- Nearly 54% of companies use a third-party support team it to connect with customers
- 78% of businesses globally feel positive about their outsourcing partners.
- Around 300,000 jobs get outsourced out of the US every year.
Some common jobs that are outsourced are:
- IT management
- Website development and other digital needs
- Administrative tasks
- Customer service
- Human Resources
- Back office support
- Data entry
- Marketing
There’s a reason that:
- The IT outsourcing market is expected to reach 397.6 billion worldwide by 2025.
- 78% of businesses nationwide feel optimistic about their outsourcing partners.
- Nearly 54% of all companies use third-party support teams to connect with customers.
Scaling your business
1. The ever so popular cost savings - Having enough capital to go around is a struggle for business owners, especially start-ups. To get your operations running it will take a real financial investment. Labor will eat up a large chunk of your funds. Outsourcing some of the tasks, especially the non-essential tasks, you can save a lot of not only money but also time and other resources.
Less employees means less salaries to pay but it also saves you on rental costs; fewer people on payroll means you don’t need a lot of space to run your business. With the money you save from outsourcing some of the tasks you could use it in other areas of your business that will actually bring in revenue like increased marketing or even fund other projects you had in the pipeline.
2. On-demand service by an expert - Picture this, you start a business in a field you are a total expert in, you're pumped and excited at the fact you’re finally your own boss and things are getting off the ground then boom the website you tried to make yourself crashes.
How will people find your business? What will you do now? Take the time away from servicing your customers and running your business to try to somehow fix it or create a new website for it to only possibly crash again? Or simply, outsource it to an expert in that field that could quickly get a new site up for you that will actually work for your business and give you credibility with a professional site? It’s really a no brainer.
You wouldn’t call a plumber to fix your roof now would you? You’re an expert at what you do, outsource some tasks to the experts so they are done right the first time. It will save you time, money and the headache but more importantly it's better for your business.
3. Outsource first, hire second - As your business starts to grow you will be inclined to quickly hire staff to meet the demands of all the tasks that need to get done for a smooth operation. Before you jump to hiring a bunch of full-time staff with high salaries determine if it’s something that could be outsourced to save you money.
When you outsource you have the benefit of just paying for services needed when you need it. It also gives you access to skilled professionals you may not be able to afford otherwise. This allows you to scale by keeping your prices competitive while still providing excellent service to your customers.
Be ok with passing the torch to others to help you with the tasks needed to run your business.
4. Build a team that rocks - Having an amazing team to back your business up is what will really help you scale. For example, when you’re known for providing top-notch customer service the word will get around. Your customers will be happy with the awesome service you provided so they will be loyal to your business and refer others. Word of mouth costs you nothing in marketing so proving totally kick-ass service so your customers are jumping for joy and can’t wait to do business with your company again and tell all their friends and family about you is definitely a great way to scale.
You may not have the time to handle all of the customer service calls yourself or have the resources to hire someone full-time in house to do it. Outsourcing your customer service is the answer! Need someone to handle your data entry or order entry? Outsource it! This way it’s done for you, for less money, by a team that specialized in that specific task.
Even if you start by outsourcing just one task, it will reduce your workload so you could focus on your skilled service. When you hire the right outsourced team, they will be dedicated to providing you and your customers top-notch service so your business can scale and become more profitable.
5. Keep your attention on tasks that generate money - With all the moving parts that need tackling daily to successfully run your service business you will need some help. There’s just not enough time in the day for you to do everything yourself, and do it right.
When you outsource some of the parts it frees you up to focus on the core business functions and income producing tasks including strategic growth planning. This could even include doing research on the top players in your field to see what they’re doing so you could model them or hitting the pavement to network. Whatever it is when you have more focus you are much more productive. Less distractions means improved production.
More fun facts: When people at work are less distracted 75% are more productive, 57% of them have increased motivation, and 49% are overall happier at work.
When your non-revenue producing tasks are outsourced you and your in-house team can stay focused on providing great service and thinking of ways to drum up more business. Not to mention you will be less stressed and overall happier!
So outsourcing will save you time, money, make you more productive so you could take your business to the next level!
6. Round the clock service - When you outsource your customer service to a team that could take calls or respond to emails for you 24/7 you won’t miss an opportunity to onboard a new customer just because you’re not available at that time.
Quick summary
While you may be Superman or Superwomen, you simply can’t do everything yourself or you will spread yourself too thin. You just can’t do your best work if you’re overwhelmed. It typically results in mistakes, poor service and bad customer service. Your business will have a hard time scaling if you’re not providing top-notch service.
Competition is high, being the top dog in your industry isn’t going to come by mistake. It’s going to take strategic planning, exceptional service and fair pricing. An excellent way to do that is through outsourcing.
Outsourcing will take some of the work off your plate so you could focus on other tasks that will help you scale and bring in more revenue. The work will get done by an experienced professional who is an expert at that exact task so it’s done right. Outsourcing will also get the work done for less cost than if you had to hire additional staff in-house which will give you more cash flow for other things that will help scale your business like marketing, technology and gives you the freedom to offer more competitive pricing.
There is much more to outsourcing than what meets the eye. If you’re looking to scale your service business give outsourcing a try!
Call Awesomecx.com and we’ll help you take your business to the next level!
Sources:
https://smallbusiness.chron.com/information-small-business-startups-2491.html
https://fortunly.com/statistics/outsourcing-statistics/#gref