Why I'm outsourcing my washing - a podcast by Michael Veazey

Today on Amazing FBA it's all about outsourcing. We had Aaron O'Sullivan on for Episodes 243 and 244 to cover big-picture outsourcing. Now it's time to get down to the nuts and bolts of why I'm outsourcing my washing up to expand my Amazon business.







The pain of inaction sometimes needs to be greater than the pain of action for us to get moving. There are only 24 hours in a day. It has become painfully obvious that mundane tasks are consuming my life. It was a beautiful day in London today; if you have ever spent any time here, you know how rare those are. As a result of outsourcing some of my domestic activities, I even got to go for a run. I've realized that if I'm going to be working, I should be doing things that provide value to the listeners and readers of Amazing FBA.



Every minute I spend washing up or pushing papers is a minute not spent delivering value to you, the very people who come to Amazing FBA for help, whether that's help getting an Amazon business through its first private label product or support to scale to 7 figures.

Nurturing Your Relationships While Building a Business

One of the things most people don't think about when starting a business is the strain entrepreneurship can put on the relationships that matter to them. Even the most supportive husband, wife, close friend or family member can feel forgotten or left behind by the startup entrepreneur.



At first, it can be challenging to build up enough capital and resources to give yourself the time you need to set aside to nourish the relationships you share with the significant people in your life. As time goes on though, it's vital that we as business people find ways to clear space for our loved ones. Without outside help, for most, fostering relationships with the people who matter to us can be difficult if not impossible.

Outsourcing the Ordinary Tasks to Focus on the Valuable Ones

The idea of building a team, for me, is exciting. No matter who you are or where you live, you can find help. I, for example, was able to record today's podcast a second time merely because of the support I received in washing up around the house and cleaning my kitchen. Without that help, I wouldn't have been able to bring the listeners of Amazing FBA the same value. In addition to the value, outsourcing provides me personally, for every task I outsource, I've created a job for someone else.

How to Justify Bringing in Paid Outside Assistance

It can be hard to break through that mental barrier and finally decide to hire a virtual assistant or housekeeper. The most straightforward argument or hiring help is the idea of £10 per hour work vs.  £100, £500 or even £10,000 per hour work. If you're washing up, that's a £10 or £15 an hour job maximum.



Now say instead you spend half an hour negotiating £1 per item off of a 5,000 unit order. That's a £10,000 per hour job. If you're too busy to do the negotiating because of some washing up, you've thrown £9,985 out the window scrubbing dishes! Most examples won't be this stark, but you'll never get to the  £10,000 per hour job level if you're stuck doing the £10 jobs.

Understanding Opportunity Cost

The first step in understanding opportunity cost is understanding James Schramko's Effective Hourly Rate. To find effective hourly rate, you take (revenue - expenses)/hours put into a project.



Let's look specifically at how to find the effective hourly rate for an Amazon product:



Say you do 10 hours of work a week for 3 months research PLUS sourcing = 130 hours

Then you work 15 hours a week for 3 weeks to launch a few weeks later when you finally receive the ...

Further episodes of Amazing FBA Amazon and ECommerce Podcast, for Amazon Private Label Sellers, Shopify, Magento or Woocommerce business owners, and other e-commerce sellers and digital entrepreneurs.

Further podcasts by Michael Veazey

Website of Michael Veazey