Outsourcing is something that I’ve tried in the past and I had a bit of a sour taste in my mouth from that experience. It didn’t work out that well, but I did learn some very important things that are pivotal to getting things. I’m back to outsourcing simply because I don’t have the time. I just can’t keep up with all the work that could potentially be done. It’s tough having a full time job and doing this on the side. I really have a lot of respect for those that make it work quite well.
I’ve been trying to make things easier for me, and that means more outsourcing is to come and more tools available to be used are coming.
Earlier this year I joined The Keyword Academy, for no other reason but Postrunner. Postrunner doesn’t eliminate work or anything like that. It just gives me an easier avenue to put articles on the web that link back to me. Eventually outsourcing the content production for some of this can really help out.
Anyway, I went on trusted Elance, where I also hired my corporate accountant, to find some link builders. The fact about link building a lot of internet marketing type services is that you’re probably going to be dealing with people from India, Philippines, and other low cost areas. It’s just the way the game works. There’s always going to be a barrier between understandings, so I’ve learned a few things about doing this right.
1. Exact action points
What do you think is going to result in a poor outcome? “10 backlinks from related niche sites of PR2 or higher” versus “I want to get on the front page of Google”. Or another example, if you were hired by a business and they told you do task a, b and c versus them telling you “go make money”? Which one would you expect to end up better? Obviously the one with exact ACTION points.
You want to stay away from vague because you’re going to (first) get someone that isn’t going to preform the way you need them too and (second) you’re going to pay a premium for this “unknown”.
If you want to do some link building than tell them what you want exactly. You want 10 unique article posts with a link back, 10 press releases with a link back, 10 social bookmarking with a link back, and 10 forum profiles with a link back. That’s exact. It’s hard to screw something like that up. A lot of people that provide these services will actually have link building packages that you can pay for and it’s simple, easy and understood. I’m sure a lot of people that do the outsourced work get a lot of shit from clients because of all this vague bullshit.
2. Be Patient and Let Them Work, But Have Accountability
It is important that you just let them work. This past month I outsourced my main site (which is still down from the latest Panda update) to do back linking on it. I just let them go and do it. It was three weeks into the month (I paid for a month of backlinking) and I didn’t see any evidence of backlinking in my stats. The point is that I let them do their work as they promised me. But I could do that because I required proof. At the end of the project, I was promptly sent a spreadsheet that documented every link. Very simple.
3. Reputation Counts
I won’t touch new members on Elance. I know that they need a chance, but I’m not interested in the risk. It’s easier for me to just hire someone with a reputation and that’s what you should do too.
Like I mentioned above, I did pay for outsourced link building for the very first time. It actually did show some results, which I’m happy with. The niche of this site is what I call a stubborn one because it takes forever for a site to show any movement. When I was doing my sniper site experiment, this site took the longest to get to the front page. I pounded it with links at that time and I gave up. One day it was on the front page making money. Since the Panda update it has been down in the rankings and I don’t have the time to throw the necessary links at it that it needs. Paying this outsourcer I did see a bounce. It’s not on the front page, but I’m almost certain it will stubbornly move up the ranks until it is back to normal.
I was happy with the service of this outsourcer, so I paid them for another month on another site.
I still have a lot to learn and long way to go with outsourcing, so I’m not trying to appear like an expert or anything. The plan this month is something a little different. I’m going to sign up for Build My Rank and going to try it out. I’m going to add a site, and pay to have them make the articles for it. 1 article a day for 30 days. It costs $2.50 per 150 words, so I’ll pay for a full 300 word article each day. Plus the $59 monthly fee. So the experiment will cost roughly $209. I’ll report on the results.