Small Business Articles

Follow The Outsourcing Trend With A Service Small Business

October 06, 2008
Mention the word outsource in the wrong group of people these days and you’re likely to receive some unwanted and rather disgruntled remarks about how the practice is stealing American jobs. That may be true in some cases, as bigger corporations move their tech support facilities and manufacturing plants to foreign nations, but there are other cases in which outsourcing, as a general practice, is creating American jobs. These business service franchises create jobs for the small business owner and his employees who work to provide other small and mid-sized companies with services that they couldn’t otherwise afford to hire an in-house staff for. And with the practice of outsourcing becoming more and more common, there is a great deal of wisdom in starting a business service franchise. There are 4 primary areas in which franchises are available in this sector: finance, technology, marketing, and human resources.

Finance

Most smaller businesses simply don’t have the resources to pay an in-house accounting staff to attend to financial matters. The next best thing is to outsource the work to other small companies that specialize in the work and can attend to specific matters as they arise, instead of being on staff, taking company dollars year-round.

One good finance home business for the fiscally-minded entrepreneur is Commercial Property Consultants, a premier name in cost segregation analysis. Unlike many finance organizations, Commercial Property Consultants is very specialized in their work, doing nothing but cost segregation, which means that very few companies could do it better. In fact, with 20 years of experience, producing reports for 10,000 clients, they promise that no one does it better. Franchisees need not have prior experience in any particular market; they receive full training and are given a turnkey operation with no future fees and an unlimited territory.

Another lucrative area of business finance is cost containment, and Alliance Cost Containment is one of the hot names in the market. Aside from saving their clients money by being outsourced instead of in-house, Alliance Cost Containment’s whole purpose is to analyze client spending, seek better pricing than they’re currently getting, and cut client costs everywhere possible. In operation since 1992, this franchise business has been perfecting their tactics, saving clients more time and more money, and teaching franchisees how to best do the same with great success.

Technology

The average business also doesn’t have the financial resources, or the need, to hire a fulltime IT staff for in-house work. But as everyone knows, computers will inevitably crash at some point, which can leave a small business in a bit of a pickle.

With access to a work from home business like Nerd Force IT, however, companies without an IT department can solve their computer problems with one call to request a technician. Franchisees enjoy getting to do the work for themselves as well as having all the benefits of being a part of a bigger organization: like the call center, 24/7 helpdesk, support team members for bigger jobs, and large-scale marketing that no small business could accomplish alone. Franchisee and client problems are thus solved.

Marketing

There are many ways to advertise, but many small-scale business owners don’t know how to do it and don’t have the resources to pay a fulltime staff to do it for them. That doesn’t leave them out in the cold, though. Businesses like WSI Internet profit from that kind of situation, while providing the best marketing work that money can buy. This franchise is the nation’s best name in internet marketing, sitting at the top of Entrepreneur Magazine’s Internet and Technology service franchises list for the last 7 consecutive years. Whether franchisees opt to work at home or open an office location, WSI Internet franchisors teach them all they need to know about finding clients and putting the internet to use as a marketing tool. There is no previous experience necessary, just the desire to use WSI Internet’s systems and make a strong and successful business.

With a wider marketing purpose than WSI Internet, franchisees with Advertising Consultants provide a wide range of 20 advertising services to their clients, including brochure making, copywriting, promotional items, magazine ads, television commercials, and internet marketing. For 10 years, this franchise operation has been serving the small business sector, providing them with big-business advertising quality at affordable prices. And the system works for franchisees as well, affording them the freedom to either dive into fulltime work or stay part-time until the home based business is strong enough to sustain the franchisee.

Human Resources

In what seems to be a budding sub-industry in the franchising world, Human Resource Rx is the first of its kind, providing business clients in small and mid-sized operations with outsourced access to HR professionals. Because developing a human resources department can be very costly, and training current employees in the laws associated with that side of business can be time-consuming and a little overwhelming, using existing HR personnel on an outsourced basis is a very wise decision. Human Resource Rx franchisees keep a staff of HR consultants to help small businesses keep their employee relationships legal without costing them an arm and a leg. Franchisees are taught how to manage staff, acquire and maintain a client base, and, if they so desire, how to operate a master franchise for an entire region.

Some people may have demonized the idea of outsourcing labor, but for many small business operators within US borders, outsourcing is their bread and butter, and it could be yours as well. Whatever field interests you, if you’d like to get into the business service industry, there are plenty of business opportunities available: those listed and many others as well. Dig around for further information and see how following the outsourcing trend could work for you.
October 06, 2008