NB: this post was prompted by a comment left by Carolie of WordMagix on an earlier post about what Sandra Bullock’s Oscar weekend teaches us about business blogging. Carolie’s comment, boiled down to its essence (the whole comment is worth reading in its entirety) was this: “Why don’t business owners outsource the stuff they’re not good at? Don’t they realize saving a few bucks is actually costing them in the long run?” She asked for my thoughts on this subject, and – knowing my tendency to run on a bit on subjects about which I have strong opinions – I agreed to do so in a separate post. Which is this. Right here. Read on.

Do It Yourself Brain Surgery? No Way. DIY Graphic Design? Why Not?! (Here’s Why Not.)

As a recent commenter noted on this blog:

Say you’re a neurosurgeon. You’d be absolutely appalled if your lawn guy decided to perform his own brain surgery, right? Or let’s pretend you’re an accountant. Wouldn’t you do your best to talk your actress friend OUT of doing her own bookkeeping — for her own sake, not just so you could get the job? As a designer and copywriter, I outsource my accounting, my surgeries, and anything else where someone else will do a better job than I!

Commenter Carolie has the right idea, and that’s exactly the right analogy, too. You wouldn’t dream of performing major surgery on yourself. (Well, if you would, you have much bigger problems than how to market your business, my friend…)

Yet day in and day out, I see solo and small biz owners do pretty much the equivalent, over and over again.

Need a new business card design? “Hey, don’t I have some application on this new desktop computer I just bought that can do business cards? I could have sworn I read something about that somewhere…”

Creating copy for a new website? “Why hire a copywriter? I can write. My tenth-grade English teacher told me so.”

Or my favorite — time to do the taxes?  ”Well, I did my own personal taxes every year when I was a W-2 worker. How much harder can it be now that I own my business? I mean, it’s not like I’m making millions of dollars or anything. Turbo Tax, here I come!”

Honestly, it makes me want to bang my head against the desk because nine times out of ten, these are the same folks — smart, capable business owners, mind you — who complain to me as their business coach that they don’t have enough time in the day to do all that marketing stuff I want them to do.

Who are also the same folks who complain at year’s end that the cash isn’t flowing as profusely as they’d like, and their bottom lines need to be relocated upwards in a hurry.

Hmm.

OK, let’s see if we can parse this out …

More Time Than Money: The Curse of the Newly-Minted Solo Entrepreneur

When we’re all just starting out, and at every point in the timeline after that launch, we’ve got three major assets to our name. No, I’m not talking about specific assets, like cars or office buildings or furniture or computers. I’m talking about:

1. Time
2. Money
3. Ourselves (personal assets, like intelligence, experience, skillsets, energy)

That last asset is pretty much static over time — sure, we might have more energy in the morning than in the afternoon (especially after that pasta primavera lunch!) but by and large, we know what we know, we can do what we’re trained to do, and those resources change slowly (and hopefully, always in the upwards, increasing direction).

But those first two … ah, there’s the rub. And generally speaking, at the beginning you’re going to have more time than money on your hands.

So, it’s understandable that you’d look at a problem — any problem (and that’s what they all appear to be, in the beginning, one big ol’ laundry list of problems) — and want to keep your cash to yourself. And if you can’t throw money at it? You throw your time at it. (And also a good healthy dose of #3 — your energies, your attention, your intellectual capital.)

It seems like it makes sense — at least, initially. It’s a problem. You have to solve it. You have some small amount of exposure to this problem’s solution set. You’ve got the time — heck, it’s not like you’ve got a ton of clients beating down your door right now. So why not tackle it yourself?

Sometimes this will be the best approach. Sometimes. But most often, you just end up hurting yourself. Why? Let’s look at numbers.

It takes me — someone who knows what a blog header is, how it functions, how big it’s supposed to be, and the basic steps of how to make one — anywhere from two to six hours to finesse a really good looking blog header.

But graphics design in general and designing headers specifically? That’s not my thing.  My “thing” is a two-ingredient casserole consisting of equal parts strategies (creative problem-solving in the marketing and administrative areas) and words (copywriting, editing, story-telling). Subsets of “my thing” include SEO (creatively using words to solve the problem of low-SERP-ranking sites), blog content creation (creatively using words to solve the problem of how to consistently generate targeted content), and SMM/SNM (creatively using words to solve the problem of connecting with target markets).

Coding sites? Creating headers? Not part of my thing. But they are the thing of other really cool and creative business owners. It takes some of them about one-eighth the time it takes me to create that self-same header. (Plus? It looks a lot better and there aren’t any of those fuzzy misplaced pixels I always end up with, damn it. Hey, why do you think I’ve had a plain text header on this site ever since the great revamp of Aught-Nine?)

Now. If I do my site’s header, I’m out eight hours, and countless amounts of stress and frustration (measured in increased heart rate, higher blood pressure, and fewer hairs — except of the grey variety). If I outsource it, I’m out $100 or so.

And I end up with a better, more reliable product.

Let’s say I charge $100 an hour for my time. (I do, actually, as a base rate, though the equivalent rate is sometimes lower for folks who purchase packages of services from me, simply because I like round numbers and I hate billing hours with the searing fiery passion of a thousand white-hot suns, but I digress.)

So, my DIY approach costs me $600. Outsourcing it costs me $100.

“But That’s IMAGINARY Money, Not Real Money!” Yes, And It Doesn’t Matter.

My newly-minted baby solos might protest, “But I don’t actually have a client that would be paying me that money, so it’s not like I’m really out an additional $500. It’s imaginary, but $100 would be awfully real!”

OK, you know what? You’re right. It is imaginary. I’m still right, though, and here’s why:

• Most importantly, it’s this: That time you’re spending on the crap you’re not good at? Could SHOULD be spent marketing your business and actually getting those clients you don’t have.

• Also, perhaps not as urgently but just as critically: The habits you’re creating now are the habits you’re going to end up with in ten years, when you’re tearing your hair out by the roots because you can’t get it all done, clients are screaming at you, and you’re about to go under, even though you’ve got all these clients beating down your door. Start refusing to outsource the crap you’re bad at now and you WILL pay the price. Maybe not now, maybe not even this fiscal year, but soon, and for the rest of your miserable business-owning life. Please. PLEASE trust me on this one.

That Ego Will Kill You(r Business)

Here’s another sneaky little truth that none of us want to admit: Solo entrepreneurs are, as a lot, raving egomaniacs.

C’mon, admit it. We so are. We think we can do it all, and do it better than anyone else, in our deepest, most secret heart of hearts. Our brains might know better, but in our hearts? We’re superheros.

You know what? We totally are. Want proof? Look at how many hats we have to wear in any given day — CEO, marketing VP, line worker, customer service, accounts receivable, research and development … I mean, it’s all us. And generally speaking, we do it pretty damned well.

The problem comes when we turn that little secret into “I can do everything …”

You know that little saying “Jack of all trades”? There’s a little-known coda to it, and it goes like this:

Jack of all trades

And Master of NONE

Here’s the Takeaway On Outsourcing

Be a master of your trade. And let others be masters of theirs.