As an affiliate marketing entrepreneur, you have an unlimited number of tasks on your to-do list. And if you aren’t careful, you could end up working 80 or 90 hours a week without blinking. Thankfully, many of the tasks can just as easily be outsourced.
The When and Why of Outsourcing
There’s a big lie in business – a lie that almost every affiliate marketing business owner tells themselves in the early stages of growth. It’s the idea that, “I’m the only one capable of doing this.” But do you want to know the cold, hard truth? You’re totally dispensable in 99 percent of your business.
And guess what? That’s good news.
The fact that 99 percent of your affiliate marketing workload (give or take) can be handed off to someone else means you have the ability to outsource. Now the question becomes, when do you outsource?
The simple rule of thumb is to outsource anything that is not a core component of your business. If there’s nothing proprietary about it, hand it off. If it makes your team more efficient at your core tasks, hand it off. If it’s more cost-effective to have someone else do it, hand it off.
The biggest key to outsourcing is to find the right partner. You can either work with individual freelancers to handle different aspects of your business, or hire one company to do it all for you. This latter option, known as outsourced marketing, has become increasingly popular in recent months. It generally leads to more consistent and streamlined results.
Outsource These Affiliate Marketing Tasks
When it comes to affiliate marketing, you’re in luck. Almost any affiliate marketing task can be outsourced with ease. Here are a few to begin with:
1. Content Writing
Content writing is probably the best affiliate marketing task to outsource. There are tons of talented freelance writers on the market, and it doesn’t take long to find them. And if you search for affiliate marketing writers in particular, you’ll get good results. These writers know how to optimize for products and links that fit into your niche. Not only will you save hours of time every week, but you’ll also get better results.
2. Design
Graphic design might look easy, but it’s a very technical and artistic skill that requires years of practice to perfect. And though you may have an eye for good design, coming up with ideas and executing on them is a totally different challenge.
By outsourcing design work to someone else, you never have to waste time on things like logos, blog images, banners, or social media graphics. Simply assign the task and wait for it to be submitted.
3. List Building
Anything that’s manual, repetitive, and time-consuming is a good candidate for outsourcing. This includes data mining, spreadsheet creation, and market research.
“List building is another time-consuming task you should outsource,” Supermetrics mentions. “This can include all sorts of lists relevant to your affiliate business. You might need a list of competitors in your niche, so you can research their content and learn from their activities.”
You don’t need to overthink this. If it’s something that can be taught and learned, it’s something that can be outsourced.
4. Video Production
Video has become the go-to content medium in today’s marketplace. Whether it’s long-form YouTube videos, short-form TikTok clips, Facebook Live, or even webinars, there’s something powerful about using video to reach and engage an audience – particularly as part of an affiliate marketing strategy. The only problem is that video equipment and software can be expensive. On top of that, it takes time and expertise to learn how to shoot and edit video. By outsourcing the production side of things, you can shift your energy and focus to the promotional side. This is a much better use of your time.
5. Social Media
Social media is obviously a very important component of affiliate marketing. It can also zap a lot of your time. Find a skilled freelance marketer and work with them to develop a weekly social media cadence. You supply the ideas, they create the content, and the content gets uploaded into an automated tool like Buffer or Hootsuite.
Work Smarter…Not Harder
As the saying goes, the goal is to work smarter…not harder. Outsourcing allows you to accomplish this by shifting some of the time and energy requirements to someone else – leaving you the space to focus on the core tasks that are most integral to your business operations.
Continue to look for new ways to make your affiliate marketing more efficient and good things will happen.
