It’s all very well to say that to get more visitors and better search engine rankings you need to keep adding unique and fresh content to your web site, but who really has the time?
One solution is to locally outsource the content research and writing and pay on a per-article or dollar per-hour basis.
By “locally outsource” I mean contract somebody with the skills you need from your local area. Not India, the Philippines, the UK or some other developing nation that you usually associate with outsourcing.
There are hundreds of well educated and motivated people out there looking for part-time work. University students, stay-at-home parents, retirees with excellent life-skills . You will be amazed at the quality of the local people out there looking for extra income. Sure you will pay more than an overseas outsourcer , but the quality is usually far better, you can conduct business face-to-face and you are keeping the money in the local economy.
Here’s a suggested process:
- Please a well written, detailed and specific ad on Gumtree or some other free part-time techniques site seeking an Admin Assistant. Make sure you include some images with the ad to attract attention. Basic Gumtree ads are free and I guarantee you if the ad is good, will have many quality applicants within 24 hours of posting your ad.
- In the ad state that you are looking for an admin contractor with their own ABN to research and write articles about whatever industry you are in. State that excellent research, typing, spelling and grammar are required. I’d suggest an hourly rate of around $20 with a minimum 3 hours per week. Based on past experience someone on $20 per hour will generate three times as much work and it will be of better quality than someone on say, $15 per hour.
- In the ad ask the applicants to send you and interesting email explaining why they want the work and what they can offer. Make sure you include the line: “Please don’t not send us your resume. We are too far too busy to read them.”
- Once you get enough responses, take down your ad from Gumtree and review the emails you have received. Eliminate any applications that included an attached resume.
- Make your selection based on the content of the email applications. Look for good spelling and grammar, a sense of humour and content that addresses your selection criteria (what you put in the ad).
- Call the top applicant and have a chat. Make an offer if it feels right. Move to the next in your list if not.
- Thank all the applicants to your ad. This is very important. All it takes is a short email.
- Start your contractor researching, writing and posting, either in your premises or they can do it from home. When they have finished their allotted time, ask them for their invoice and pay it immediately.
For your $60 per week you could probably get two to three fresh and well written articles or pages for your web site. And I’m sure you will find lots of other useful admin tasks for them to do ranging from Twitter tweeting, data entry and competitor analysis. And now finally, you have someone to update that Facebook page you created 18 months ago and have not touched since 🙂
