The Beauty of Outsourcing
What Gabrielle Outsources:
It took me a long time to decide to outsource. The first thing I outsourced was taxes, and that happened because the first time I filed taxes as a business I paid a lot and it felt like I did everything wrong. The next year I went to a CPA and he saved me thousands of dollars because he actually knew what I could write off as a business. I do not enjoy business taxes or finances, so this was a no-brainer to keep going back to him.
Then, I started outsourcing social media. I did not enjoy being on Instagram, coming up with captions, or deciding what to post. I couldn’t keep up with all of the sneak peek galleries, and I felt like I wasn’t sharing all of the amazing pictures for my clients, and I wasn’t using Instagram to the fullest. So I found a social media manager who helps keep track of trends, creates reels, knows the best time to post, and will come up with captions based on blog posts - so she’s always sharing loaded captions that are full of information for my future clients!
Next up were some galleries to be edited. I couldn’t keep up with the workload during the fall and I wanted my clients to receive their galleries faster than I could get them out. So I started sending a couple of galleries to be edited (not culled, yet.) For a while, I only sent galleries to be edited when I was incredibly busy. Once I had Beatrice and I had to stay on top of emails, and actually photographing, I decided to start sending all of my galleries to be culled and edited. I still go through after each gallery that’s edited to do some tweaking and I edit all of the black and white copies and then upload the gallery myself. But the time I save with culling and editing relieves *so* much stress and I know my clients are receiving their galleries a million times faster than I can deliver by myself.
After all of that, I got addicted to outsourcing. I realized that my business had reached a point where I could no longer wear all of the hats and that others were just as capable (if not more) to do a beautiful job. So I hired someone to help me write blogs every month. Now I’m finally getting out the educational blogs I’ve always wanted to share with my clients. I come up with the blog idea, send a general outline, answer specific questions, and that’s it. It’s amazing having someone from the outside who is holding me accountable every month to let me know when a blog is due. Now my clients are always raving about the education they’re finding on my site, and it’s saving me time so I don’t have to repeat myself over and over when I’m helping clients plan their elopement. They can find all the answers to their questions over on the blog.
From there my blogger sends out an email every month that includes the new blog posts, and she pins the blogs on Pinterest. After she sent my first email out, I got an inquiry within minutes from a past client. I couldn’t believe the return on investment that I literally got within minutes.
I also hire a nanny who comes in for just a couple of hours every week. During those couple of hours I know I have designated time to do deep work, and do the parts of my job that only I can do (editing sneak peeks, planning specific with clients, hopping on phone calls, updating my client guides, dreaming up big dreams, answering questions from the women I outsource to, etc.)
The latest thing I outsourced was my inbox and calendar. I hired an office manager who helps me keep up with tasks, organizes my client relations, responds to inquiries quickly (I’ve never received so many “thanks for responding so quickly!” as I do now with my office manager!), and keeps my calendar up to date.
While outsourcing can be expensive, I see my return on investment every single month. I also get time back so I can spend it with my daughter and with my husband and other family/friends so I don’t feel guilty when I take time off. My business is always being taken care of.
What Clare Outsources:
I outsource:
Instagram and Facebook
Pinterest during busy season
Some of my blogging
Yearly taxes.
I occasionally outsource gallery editing and any in-depth Photoshop edit requests.
I used to be a social media manager before I went full-time with photography, so initially, I felt guilty outsourcing the majority of my social media, but I realized that my followers were almost never seeing my new work because I was too busy shooting and keeping up with admin tasks. Now that I’ve hired a social media manager she keeps my online presence consistent and growing while I’m out doing what I do best. She sends me content she’s pulled together every week, and I either approve or edit that, and she takes care of hashtags, captions, and posting.
I outsource blogging for similar reasons - during busy season, I don’t have time to sit down and write 1,000 words about each shoot while I have dozens of galleries on my queue. I trained my sister, who’s a journalism major, to write these for me. I write out a brief outline, keywords I want included, and a link to the gallery of photos. She writes the rest.
I do not enjoy, whatsoever, dealing with taxes or bookkeeping. But obviously, this is an incredibly important thing that has to be done every quarter, and it has to be done right. Hiring a CPA is the very first thing I ever outsourced and I never regret it. I pull together the reports and expenses, and then my CPA fills out whatever the IRS needs, and tells me at the end how much I owe yearly and quarterly.
Why We Decided to Outsource
Outsourcing is intimidating at first, especially if you don’t believe in the value of your own time. Some see outsourcing as paying someone hundreds of dollars to do a task that you could do yourself if you could just manage your time better. We were in the same boat. But, after listing to a podcast by Jai Long, we realized that our time was better spent doing things only we could do - that would, in the long run, end up making us more money.
For example, we’re both photographers primarily. Only we can go out and shoot elopements or families. We don’t need to spend those five hours a month sitting down and organizing our Instagram calendar. Instead, we could hire a social media manager and pay her monthly to do that, while we’re out shooting and bringing in enough money to more than cover her salary.
This also means that instead of also having these other tasks on our to-do list, we got that time “back” to pursue other business ventures, or spend more time with our families or pursuing other hobbies like gardening or cooking.
How to Determine What You Should Outsource
What are the things that you keep saying you’ll get to, but never do? Does it stress you out that you still haven’t done it, because you know it’s important to your business? This is where we both started.
What are things that only *you* can do? Is your business one that you need to show up physically for? Or, maybe there’s a part of your business that’s so specialized that only you know how to do it? These are tasks that you won’t be able to outsource unless you eventually train someone. Everything else, mostly administrative tasks, is able to be outsourced because there are people out there where that specific task is *their* specialty, and they’ll be able to do it better than you ever could.
Are there parts of your business that you dread doing, that needs to be done, but you feel like you’re the only one who can do it? There’s likely a person out there that can do that task better than you ever could!
Where To Find Assistants
The Rising Tide Society
Instagram and Pinterest (search for titles like “social media manager” or “elopement virtual assistant”)
Posting A Job On Your Social Media
LinkedIn
Honeybook Professionals Page
Word of Mouth
Upwork or Fiverr
Local Colleges
Podcasts That Convinced Us To Outsource
The Heart & Hustle Podcast: Grow Your Business without it Demanding More Of You
Make Your Break Podcast: Steps To Outsourcing Low-Value Tasks
Goal Digger Podcast: Three Reasons You Need A VA Now More Than Ever
Goal Digger Podcast: Tips For Hiring The Right People For Your Business