One of the biggest challenges when you move from a corporate job to becoming an entrepreneur is how to handle the diverse demands for your time. In the corporate world you usually have a specified role and an area of focus and expertise. A host of other responsibilities are handled by support staff and by the corporate infrastructure as a whole. You are free to focus on your specific mission and deliver results that contribute to overall corporate success.
As soon as you open the doors of your own business, you quickly learn just how complex those other support staff jobs were. All of a sudden, as a new owner, you have to handle everything. You may have paychecks to process, issues with inventory, purchase orders to prepare and billing to do. All of that is in addition to time you need for strategic development, marketing and sales. Fortunately, there are a number of areas you can outsource so you have time to focus on being a CEO.
Payroll Processing
When you have employees and need to process payroll there are a lot of moving parts. Once you have determined their pay for the period the work has just begun. You have to accurately calculate payroll deductions for federal, state and local tax. There’s also Social Security and Medicare to consider as well as court ordered child care payments. From there you have to handle direct deposit or printing and distributing the checks.
Beyond all of the payroll processing runs there are key payroll tax filing deadlines that involve a lot of paperwork. Rather than handling payroll in-house it’s a great idea to business process outsource to a national firm that specializes in this area. They will handle everything for you and keep your employees happy with on-time, accurate paychecks.
Retirement Services
When you have just started a business, you may not think of retirement any time soon. One of the best things about having your own business, though, is that you can offer retirement options that shelter corporate profits and individual income and give you funds for your future. There are many options to choose from, such as 401K plans that offer pre-tax savings and 401K with profit sharing that has higher contribution limits.
Your first step should be to set up a meeting with an executive from top regional retirement services firm so they can learn about your business and your short- and long-term needs. From there they’ll be able to recommend the best solutions for you. The plans they set up will help you save money and improve employee recruitment and retention too.
Marketing Services
In today’s world, marketing is extremely complex. Customers and potential prospects are literally inundated by content on social media and it is harder and harder for an individual business to get noticed. You’ll need crisp copywriting, savvy public relations and great social media campaigns to even get your message through. Many times, it’s also important to develop local, non-media campaigns to get your name in front of prospects.
Marketing is often an art form rather than a science and best practice guides for successful marketing on social media are constantly changing. There is little chance that you can handle all of this in-house. The best thing to do is contract with a marketing agency that has expertise across all of these disciplines. That way, you get to tap into their knowledge and creativity and be the beneficiary of their excellent campaigns.
If you want to be successful in business, one of the best things you can do is to outsource functions to groups that are recognized experts in what they do. By delegating these tasks, you will free yourself up to handle the strategic side of the business so your company can quickly prosper and grow.
