Five Reasons Outsourcing is on the Rise

Sometimes it seems when the word outsourcing is mentioned, it almost feels like a dirty word.  Many American workers think outsourcing means firing Americans and shipping their jobs overseas.  That is one type of outsourcing also called offshoring, but there are other beneficial methods of outsourcing that are continuing to grow in popularity.

Here are my five biggest reasons outsourcing will grow in this new decade.

1.  It's necessary to stay competitive – Whether you're a big company or a small one, new innovations that are important to business keep coming up.  Unless you've got a guru on staff that stays on top of important changes, you'll have to hire someone either internally or a consultant.  Not every business can afford to hire internal staff, hence the importance of outsourcing the business process.

Besides the business importance, there are financial considerations.  When a business hires an employee for an annual salary of $40,000, it's not their only cost.  There's workman's compensation insurance, healthcare benefits and sometimes retirement or 401k benefits involved as well.  Plus hiring that employee taxes your human resources department.  In today's economy lean and mean is the way to stay competitive and outsourcing provides that advantage.

2. Your competition is already doing it – Whether you believe it or not, your competition is already outsourcing.  It could be accounting or marketing, but they're already doing it.  They may be offshoring for huge savings or they could just be sending out business processes they don't want to handle internally any more.  The point is by outsourcing they're improving their business by producing goods or services cheaper, better or more efficiently.  If that's not improving their business and market share now, it will soon.  The more your competition outsources is the more pressure it will place on you to do the same thing.  Embrace the change.

3. More workers are available for it – Over the past year and a half, 15 million people have lost their jobs.  Some have found new jobs in similar fields paying the same or even a little more.  Others have found new jobs paying significantly less and have adapted their lifestyles to compensate.  The vast majority are still looking for a job and many have given up.  The best of these are free-lancing now and available for outsourced opportunities.  Some have formed small businesses and are working for multiple small jobs to make money, keep their skills up and pass the time.

If leaner and meaner is the business trend, more opportunities are being created for free-lancers or consultants and because of financial scarcity, businesses seeking outsourced workers can find excellent values for experienced talent.

4. Creative thinking is creating more industries that benefit from it – The first wave of outsourcing involved manufacturing and moved to customer service call centers.  The evolution of outsourcing and technology allows just about any business function that doesn't require direct knowledge or contact to be outsourced.  Think about business functions like bookkeeping, accounting, graphic design, computer programming and even marketing and retail sales.

All of these processes are being successfully outsourced and this segment of the economy will continue to grow in the United States and worldwide.  Even the offshore labor pool is developing as China, former Eastern bloc countries and Israel are entering the outsourcing mix.

5. It's easier than ever to do it – With more top notch talent available in the United States and better offshore labor available throughout the world, it's easier and smarter to outsource now than ever before.  The trend has developed over the past twenty years that experienced business outsourcing companies can supply excellent results with a comparatively lower price tag.  Technology has enabled sites like Craigslist, oDesk and Elance to name a few to be outsourced market places for buyers and suppliers alike.  The increasing success of outsourced labor will only guarantee it continues to grow.

As you can see, these five trends are contributing greatly to wider adoption of outsourcing for businesses.  As long as outsourcing continues to be cost effective, efficient and delivers quality results, I can't see any reason it would go away.  If you're not taking advantage of this trend now, you soon will be or get left behind.

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Nigel Swaby is a Salt Lake City SEO writer offering web marketing consulting with a focus on organic SEO, PPC (SEM) and social media. He's been in the Internet marketing space for 11 years and has expertise in real estate, mortgages, business, marketing, SaaS and secondary education.