Heather Porter’s Outsourcer Recommendation

Laura: Heather, a lot of the things that we share with our listeners I know probably come off as easier said than done, and I think a lot of those things are actually quite easy. It’s the fear factor that gets in their way, and one of the things that I see is a lot of people are so intimidated by hiring an outsourcer or an outtasker. They don’t actually realize A, how easy they are to find, and B, how simple it is to get that process going.

So what is a resource that you use and you can share that helps you to find outtaskers or outsourcers and kind of give an example of how you pull that through?

Heather: I’m going to actually share two because I think this is going to be a really good distinction on the types of tasks that you can get done and where you can go.

So for those of you that have never outsourced before, I highly recommend starting with Fiverr because that’s where you can go get work for $5 per pop, and you know, you can do add-ons from there if you want, but it’s so easy to use and it’s one of those things where if you like literally have no idea what to outsource, why don’t you just start by having somebody do some research for you for a blog or write 10 social media post. Something like that. Just pick something that is non-threatening to you.

But for Fiverr, what we’d like to use it for is to find voiceover artist. So we do not only our podcast, but we have done-for-you podcast for some of our clients, and a part of that is getting the intro and the outro created. So like you guys are listening to this right now. We have the little jingle at the start and at the end. So those artists, those voiceover talent, that is found on Fiverr, and you can go in, and you can say, you know, “American male accent voiceover artist.†You could do English, British woman accent.

It’s the coolest thing and you’ll find loads of people in there. So Fiverr is great for those little one off task like that, but we also use Elance, and Elance is where like, for example, I have somebody that’s worked with us now, gosh, I think 8 months. Anyway, he’s brilliant and what he does is he’s a video editor, and he also edits our podcast, so he’s a bit of a sound video guy, and we found him on Elance, and because of the beauty of these sites, you get to be protected because especially with Elance, you put money in an account, and you only have to pay it out once the job is completed.

So it’s protecting both sides, and after a while, we build up trust for these people, and sometimes, we continue to use the platform or we’ll take it offline and start to integrate them more closely into our business, but what’s cool is we use him on Elance. We use the Elance system and we use our own Basecamp, so we’re using our project management system to manage him, and he’s there, you know, off run. Sometimes we use him for 20 hours a week, sometimes none, but it’s so… It’s brilliant to have his talent at your fingertips, not very expensive, and easy to find.

Laura: And to not feel the pressure of having to employ somebody…

Heather: No.

Laura: …full time.

Heather: That’s why the systems worked so well because they… the people on these platforms are not necessarily looking for full time work. Actually, a lot of them are not. So you’re actually fitting into their business requirements as much as you, you know, want for your own business.

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