Whether you own a small business or are part of a fast-growing company, you probably hear about “outsourcing” all the time. But what is business outsourcing? And what are the benefits that come with it? In this article, you can discover all of this and more, along with some real-life examples.

What is Business Outsourcing?

Business outsourcing is when a business hires a third party to take care of a specific task. Usually, a business will do this when they don’t have any in-house specialists who can do the task themselves. Essentially, it’s an excellent cost-cutting measure — so there’s a lot to like about it.

These days, businesses are outsourcing all kinds of business tasks. One of the most commonly outsourced tasks is SEO marketing, which you can outsource to clickintelligence.com. SEO marketing is a type of marketing that focuses on boosting your business website up the search engine rankings so that there’s more chance of customers finding you through Google.

On top of this, businesses are also outsourcing other important tasks such as social media marketing, email marketing, accounting, and customer service. Anything you can think of, there’s a good chance it can be outsourced.

The Benefits of Outsourcing

Now, let’s take a closer look at some of the benefits you can expect from outsourcing.

Reduced Costs

Because of global inflation, almost all businesses are looking to reduce costs. Thankfully, outsourcing is a great strategy for achieving this, as it means you can transfer workloads to specialists as and when you need to. The Harvard Business Review even states that you achieve cost reductions of 20-30% just by outsourcing non-core business tasks, which is great to know.

Access to Specialist Knowledge

No matter which business functions you outsource, you’ll gain access to specialist knowledge from the third-party companies that you choose. This knowledge will then allow you to run your business in a smarter and more cost-effective way.

Focus on Core Business Tasks

When all of your chosen business tasks have been outsourced, you can then exclusively focus on the core business tasks that you’re good at, such as sales. Think of it as having a weight removed from your shoulders — that’s what outsourcing is all about!

Outsourcing Example 1: Apple

Everybody knows about Apple. The chances are you probably own an iPhone or other type of product from Apple. But did you know that Apple outsources nearly all of its manufacturing to China through third-party companies such as Foxconn? This is so that Apple can gain access to specialist workers while also saving money on labor costs.

Outsourcing: Example 2: WhatsApp

It’s estimated that 2.78 billion people around the world use WhatsApp. Interestingly, WhatsApp outsources its customer service to third-party companies so that they can provide customer service 24/7. Without doing this, WhatsApp would only be able to provide customer service to local US WhatsApp users, which simply wouldn’t be enough when you consider the fact that WhatsApp has such a large pool of global users.

Summary

Outsourcing is the present and future of business operations. It’s recommended you use outsourcing as a strategy to reduce costs, boost efficiency, and gain access to the skills that aren’t available to you in-house.