• Taskenator
• Oct 22, 2019

How Small Business Owners can Cultivate Their Business through Onboarding Freelancers

How Small Business Owners can Cultivate Their Business through Onboarding Freelancers

As a small business owner, you’re probably already aware of just how easy it is to get overwhelmed with work, especially when your company goes through cycles of high and low activity levels throughout the year. It can get even more challenging when you’re trying to scale or grow your business. You’ll often hear of the importance of finding the right tools and processes that can grow with you, to ensure sustained productivity at every stage. Of course, you’ll also need to consider revamping your company’s workforce in order to meet the growing pains of your scaling efforts. After all, what worked when you had 10 clients will not necessarily work when you have 100 clients. 

However, allocating funds to hire more full-time employees can be a difficult decision, even more so if your small business goes through periodic lulls in activity. This is because in many instances, hiring employees to help with your growing business will cost you more than their actual salaries. Luckily, choosing to hire expert freelancers is a great way to staff up during this critical period without taking on the risks and responsibilities associated with growing your full-time roster.

The Case for Onboarding Freelancers to Grow Your Business

Not that long ago, freelancers were viewed as the people that carried out menial outsourced responsibilities. If a company had a low-skilled, repetitive task such as data entry or phone support that no full-timer wanted, they'd find top-quality freelancers and delegate it to them. But today’s growing number of highly skilled talents choosing the freelance route shows that it's not just mundane tasks that they're choosing to take on any more.

In fact, as of two years ago, about 40% of over 1,200 American adults polled by NPR and Marist said they did freelance work in addition to their regular jobs. This shifting workforce is a strong signal to CEOs and budding entrepreneurs to rethink their internal organizational structures. If professionals and talented individuals are no longer keen on full-time employment, then you’ll need to consider how you will structure your teams going forward.

Some companies are already taking full advantage of this shift and have worked out models where they have both full-time staff and freelancers on their payroll. Publishing, for example, was one of the first industries to experiment with this model and record varying forms of success in business cultivation and growth. Over time, freelance editor and writer services became ubiquitous in the online job marketplace. Other professionals soon followed suit, and we’re now seeing freelance graphic design services, software developers, project managers, and research analysts adopting the freelance mentality. 

Business Advantages of  Onboarding Freelancers 

Here are some key benefits of moving your small business to a similar model: 

1. Specialized Talent

With freelancers, you can choose from a pool of specialized skill sets that are meant to address a particular need in your business. For example, it is now commonplace to hire a freelance web developer to work on projects such as adding new functionality to your website, web maintenance, and other related material. This person’s primary focus is on web development, nothing else. This way, you know you are hiring somebody with specialized talent and has what it takes to deliver top-notch results.

2. Less Overhead

The costs associated with hiring a new employee can get quite prohibitive real fast, especially when you’re a one-person company. You’re not only navigating costs in time and salaries, but also in terms of office space, equipment, benefits, and much more. 

With a freelance professional, you never have to concern yourself with filing employment paperwork, creating an onboarding program, or office space, equipment, and other similar details. Plus, you’re not required to pay Social Security, Medicare and other payroll taxes. The amount you save from onboarding freelancers could then bolster your bottom line or reinvested in the business for more growth opportunities. 

3. Increased Flexibility

Having an employee means you need to keep the person busy at all times; with a freelancer, however, you get to simply use their services for a set period of time and then let them go on their way until they are needed again. Also, if there’s a change in your project or business plan, it’s a lot easier to find freelancers who will match your needs, since they are usually accustomed to working on multiple projects and have the ability to pivot quickly to provide solutions. This essentially allows you to get the help you need without keeping somebody on payroll.

4. Immediate Assistance

If you’ve ever hired an employee, then you know that for the most part, there is nothing quick about the process. This means that it can take a long time to get the help you need. With a freelancer, however, you can get up and running in a more efficient manner. For instance, it’s generally a lot faster to hire a freelance ios app developer than it is to hire an in-house employee with the same qualifications. Hiring an employee could take many weeks or months, whereas hiring a freelancer could be accomplished within a matter of hours or days. In addition, there is less paperwork as well as fewer hassles in regards to training.

Onboard Expert Freelancers on Taskenator

Scaling your business is a good thing, but it often comes with some growing pains. In any case, the people you hire will always play a critical role in the growth of your organization. Freelance work is here to stay and if business keeps moving in its current direction, chances are there won’t be any way to get around bringing more than one freelancer into the fold. So make sure you’ve got the right processes and online freelance marketplace in place for success. 

That’s where Taskenator comes in. This global freelancing platform connects savvy business owners with freelancers from all over the world. Find expert freelancers who can take certain tasks like digital marketing, web design, copywriting, mobile app developments, data entry jobs, and so much more off your hands. This way,  you can focus on other core aspects of your business and scale it for sustained success. 

Create your account on Taskenator today and enjoy the many benefits of onboarding freelancers to grow your business!