Looking to Outsource Blogging Tasks - What do you do?

[Blogelina]

I'm really at a point with my blogging that I need to seriously consider outsourcing some of my tasks - it's gotten so busy that I just don't have time to keep up with everything! A good problem, I know!

But, the bad problem is that I have no idea where to start with choosing what to outsource and then how to even go about finding the people to outsource to and set all that up.

Anyone here outsourced part of their blogging? If you could share any tips, I would really appreciate it!

[dlandry]

Are you talking about outsourcing some posting or behind the scenes work?

I've heard of some bloggers hiring people to list their giveaways on different sites and they pay a certain amount per site. Some hire people to go through emails.

If it's outsourcing posts, I've done that with product reviews. I brought one person on and didn't know much about her and it was a disaster. She did one review then accepted several others but fell off the face of the earth or at least stopped responding to any of my emails or messages. She didn't do the reviews and after about 5 months I contacted the companies, apologized and offered to write an article promoting their product and give them a couple of months free advertising.

I now have 12 women doing reviews and had an application they filled out. After I reviewed their applications and saw a sample of their writing either on their own blogs or a sample they sent me I sent a document outlining how reviews are done, what I expected from each of them and at the end told them if they were still interested to let me know and we'd get it set up. They started with 1 review and if that went well we progressed from there. I haven't had a problem yet.

I've since brought on another writer who does "The Look for Less" type of posts. She has a couple of links in her bio to promote a couple of places she works for which I don't mind since her posts bring me a lot of traffic. She started posting as a guest and I've recently given her access to post whenever she feels like it.

I'd suggest you list all the things you do for your blog and then decide what tasks you'd be willing to outsource. You then need to figure out how much time those tasks would take up and how much it's worth for someone else to do them.

[ktjones]

The only thing I have ever outsourced per say is allowing some good friends that I know to guest post on my blog. I really wouldn't know what type of advice to give to you in regards to that topic; however, I can certainly help in accomplishing your blogging tasks! Just let me know and we can see what we can come up.

[beanandpumpkin]

I have outsourced a few assignments, and look forward to doing so in the future as well. I know a writer in real life who has a writing style similar to my own, so I know that I can trust her to cover a topic as well as I would. I also have found a couple of writers here... I would not post a "I need help" type of post, because I have done it a couple of times for a client of mine, and was inundated with tons of PMs... and that was for very low-paying work! I can't even imagine what the response would be if I were to post offering a higher rate of pay! What I have done is go through some of the threads on the freelancers forum, and clicked on a bunch of people's blogs/websites. When I've found what I was looking for, I contacted those writers directly.

[TexasMel]

I've tried it and haven't had much luck -- probably because I don't have the funds to actually pay a pool of writers. Depending on what you need "outsourced" you can instead "write ahead" -- write blog posts and set a "publish at a future time" on them. I do the same thing with Twitter "tweets."

[SinfullySoft]

There are many sites where you can find competitive rates for outsourcing your work. For example, many of my writing jobs come from oDesk.com - people work for cheap from many other countries. However, you may find that you get what you pay for so if you're not willing to pay a decent rate or unable to, you may not get high quality work. Just something to think about.

[Stephanie Mojica]

You could also try to find an intern through a local college to help promote your blog, maintain comments, etc. That might work better for people with low budgets who would rather not deal with a potential English language barrier.

Good luck!

Stephanie

[Krystle512]

All of you are very inspiring! I hope to one day have so much work that I need help but I haven't even launched my blog yet lol.

[EcoConsciousMom]

I have only really outsourced writing blog posts by looking for guest authors. My Blog Guest was recommended by James Penn (internet marketer) and I have had great success with it. I've probably posted a dozen guest articles in the past 2 weeks. If you have WordPress they can register, submit an article and all you do is proof it and push publish.

You can read his article here:
How To Get Free Original Content & Free Traffic On Auto-Pilot

Looking at his "Write For Us" page also helped me SEO my guest authoring post. This can help the proactive bloggers searching for posting opportunities to find you.

Another tip I read on Problogger. Add a little extra to the top of the post to give more links and credit to keep guest authors happy. You could add something like, "This is a guest post by Jane Smith who loves to write at home while homeschooling her daughter. To write a guest post, please check out our guest posting guidelines here." (Link accordingly)

Good luck,
Brianne