Four services that your small business should outsource

February 25 2021 - As an entrepreneur or small business owner, you inevitably end up having to wear a lot of different hats and take on a broad range of tasks in order to be successful. However, these days, rather than handling everything in-house, it’s becoming more common to outsource certain jobs to external companies or expert freelancers. This can be an extremely beneficial option because it not only frees up your time to focus on those aspects of your business that you love or that only you can do, it also enables you to benefit from specialist knowledge and technology. Plus it can also help you to keep your company’s costs down, as you don’t have to hire more permanent full-time staff.

Interested? Here are four suggestions for services you should outsource to get you started.

1. Accounting

For those of us who are not financial experts, figuring out the complexities of how to do your accounting and bookkeeping can be a real headache. Thus it’s no surprise that so many companies choose to outsource this part of their business. Working with an experienced professional (or a team) in this area is a great way to ensure that you don’t accidentally fall foul of any legal requirements, confuse tax rules, or experience other similar pitfalls.

2. Payroll

Whatever the size of your company or the number of employees you have, outsourcing your payroll services can be extremely beneficial. It ensures that all of your staff get paid accurately and on time, without you having to hire a dedicated HR team or learn all the ins and outs of the job yourself. It also means that you don’t have to worry about keeping up with legislation changes in this area, and you can simply allow the experts to handle everything from pensions to payslips.

3. Design

Graphic design, whether for print or digital media, is often an area that business owners think they can take care of themselves. However, unless you have real talent in this area, that approach is likely to be a mistake. Design is a skill, and because customers make judgements about you and your company within seconds of seeing your website or promotional materials it’s vital to get it right. Luckily it’s extremely easy to hire freelancers for this work, meaning you can choose the perfect person for each individual project or task if you want. No matter if it’s your company logo or one single advert, the investment is more than worth it.

4. E-commerce fulfilment

If you work in a field that involves shipping physical items out to customers and you receive more than just a few orders per week, outsourcing the picking, packing and distribution to an external company could save you both physical space and time.

It can also save you money because professional e-commerce fulfilment companies often have access to preferential postage rates that you don’t. Therefore, rather than wasting your skills on manual labour, you can focus on the parts of your role that really ran money - such as growing your business even more!

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