Actionable advice: The power of outsourcing throughout business growth

outsourcing

The means of outsourcing has enabled many businesses to distribute chosen projects to third parties, where they can free up more of their time to focus on other key areas of the business. Outsourcing also enables businesses to reach out to talented individuals, who have the skills to fulfill these outsourced tasks at the required standards.

To explore these benefits further, we conducted a series of short interviews with a number of successful business owners. These insights offer up some interesting information around the subject of outsourcing and what methods are available within the industry.

First we spoke to Andrew O’Connor, the Founder of Sportz Smash, his website for a game which offers a new twist on Candy Crush. Andrew highlights what led to the creation of his business and how his success was derived entirely on the basis of outsourcing.

What made you decide to start the business?

I have always loved gaming since I was a kid (I guess I still am!) I am always looking to new games to play from the App Store and I have been playing a lot of match 3 games the past few year and I really enjoy them. Something inside me was thinking yeah these are really good but there are all candy related, it would be nice to have something different. Then I had to idea of a match 3 game with a sports theme as I have studied sports for a number of years. I then started to really get hooked on this idea and started to plan it out. What should the design look like, what sort of sports balls should I use etc. It was really after January 2016 when I wanted to do new things and I was determined to set up my own game development company and release a game in the App Store. I really believed in the idea and thought it was too good to not do, so I went for it and very happy I did.

What services do you currently outsource?

I basically had to outsource everything in order to make the game. There are some many companies and people to choose from and I think this was the hardest thing, actually picking who to hire out of an endless list. I had a very small team, all who were freelancers. I hired an artist to make the designs for my game. It is a lot harder than you think to pin down small detail as to and a game developer to make it come to life. I hired someone to promote my game via social media and someone to take care of SEO for my website to get it on the 1st page of Google and Bing. I have published press releases on various websites for free which has also helped to create to a bigger profile for Sportz Smash.

How has this helped your business to grow?

It has helped to grow an worldwide following on Twitter and Facebook with very little spend. It really has been invaluable. The more people that know about my app the better as it can make the difference from being a success or a failure. I have created my own website which I think is one of the top things to do for any business. Without a website customers will be less likely to have an interest in your services and products. I am constantly looking for new ways to promote my mobile game and I work every day to promote it via app review website and promoting it on various websites.

What advice do you have for other entrepreneurs looking into outsourcing?

I would say this is one of the the most important things for most businesses. Create a budget, do your research and select the company/organisation that is right for you. It is very important to make sure that the content you are promoting/sharing is of a high standard before sharing it as first impression are vital to your success. Don’t be afraid to get other involved in it makes having a better product. One of the most obvious things but it is true…you pay for what you get.

We then spoke to Ed Major, the Co-Founder of Orca Social, a business-to-business social technology consultancy. He opens up about the early stages of the business and how the means of outsourcing was necessary and led to the growth of the business.

What made you decide to start the business?

Our company was formed after seeing that there was a lack of knowledge in major B2B companies of how to use social technologies. Previously I was working at Oracle and we were selling a social media management platform to companies who often didn’t have a social media strategy in place. One of our clients was Jonathan Wichmann of Maersk Line and he had a famous case study on to use social media effectively across the business. Jonathan was looking to leave and we both saw that there was an opportunity to help companies role out an effective plan internally with our expertise.

What services do you currently outsource?

We currently outsource legal, finance and some areas of content marketing. Outsourcing legal makes sense to make sure we have the correct employment and client contracts in place. We use a designer to produce most of our marketing content and a copywriter to support them too. We also use a wide range of cloud based apps to help us manage our daily activities which include, google business apps, Citrix GoTo Meeting, email marketing software and CRM.

How has this helped your business to grow?

Using a financial advisor helped us to spot savings which were used to support our marketing initiatives, client services and bringing in new people. Having an outsider create content enabled us to bring a fresh perspective to our work and more imaginative output to the design. Our latest eBook was downloaded by over 1000 companies which led to new business leads that are now supporting our growth. This was also produced at a fraction of the cost of using UK outsourcers as we worked with people in Spain and Germany where the costs were lower.

What advice do you have for other entrepreneurs looking into outsourcing?

My advice would be to embrace it sooner rather than later as it’s essential to a start ups growth. It’s not possible to do everything yourself as a start up and its important for the internal team to focus on what they are good at. By outsourcing specific tasks and projects you can focus on your core business and bring far better skills to these activities.

The information derived from these interviews can be used as actionable advice by other entrepreneurs. Where the means of outsourcing acts as a fundamental tool in encouraging the growth of businesses!

Author Bio: Alec Laurie is the Managing Director and Principle Recruitment Consultant of Technology and Business Change Leadership at Laudale. Laudale are specialists in recruiting IT and business change exclusively in the North of England