MARKETING OUTSOURCING – WORKING WITH

FREELANCERS, SPECIALISTS, AND TALENTS FOR

DEMAND GENERATION
According to surveys by leading organizations, there are almost 53 million freelance workers just in
the American market who astonishingly occupy one-third of the total work force. A significant
percentage of companies are outsourcing specialized jobs that are part of high-value projects – a
study by Truelancer website reveals that the global market for freelancers is worth $2-3 billion, of
which India accounts for about $1 billion. The scenario is especially true in the demand generation
scenario. However, despite incredible options in the freelance sector, most of the new-age
enterprises face several challenges in discovering and utilizing the right creative talents for their
specialized needs.

Let us take a closer look at these problems before suggesting measures to enhance the productivity
of freelancers and specialists – also called the contingent workforce.

Challenges faced by organizations in finding the right freelancers and

specialists

1. Ability to map the right candidate to the right talent

Companies usually receive innumerable work portfolios and requests from freelancers, but they
often find it difficult to zero in on the right candidate, especially in case of urgent content demands
for specific demand generation campaigns. Associating with creative professionals adept at
providing intelligent content for product marketing is the key to success in today’s marketplace. But
the toughest challenge is mapping the required talent with the right freelancer when time is of the
essence.
 1. Insufficient resources
Not every company is financially adept to meet the resource demands of maintaining a permanent
team of skilled content specialists. Freelancers or the contingent workforce is a trusted option in
such cases. However, getting this skill set on board for a limited period under a flexible work
arrangement is a challenge owing to the exceptions that need to be planned. This variance restricts
companies from exploring all available options for delivering intelligent content marketing strategies
for demand generation.

1. Finding the right balance between flexibility and always being on call
The freelancers and specialists also feel the pressure of temporary arrangements where the balance
between flexibility and the need to always be on call with the companies is at stake. The pace of
content marketing approaches for demand generation varies across organizations – with different
strategies and goals. Hence freelancers are often forced to juggle varying strategies, ways of
working, and roles across organizations at a single point of time.

1. Contracting the wrong fit based on a one-dimensional assessment

We often come across instances where some people appear strong in their resume and perform well
in the initial meeting, but eventually stumble when you associate with them on a project. As a result,
the entire content generation process is tense, stretched out, and repetitive with plenty of back and
forth and possible delays in planned schedules.

1. Inability to meet standard organization benchmarks

Despite regularly hiring freelancers and specialists, companies find that sometimes this workforce
struggles to meet standard performance benchmarks, which might even adversely affect their lead
generation strategies, especially in case of content marketing for technology products. Companies
find themselves spending a lot of time and effort on inducting the contingent workforce into the
business essentials in terms of demand generation goals and strategies, sometimes with hardly any
positive response.
So what are the best options that companies have to enhance the productivity
of freelancers and specialists?

1. Involving them in relevant business objectives

The best strategy to enhance the productivity of freelancers and specialists is to ensure their active
participation in the organization’s marketing initiatives. This approach would actually help the
specialists and freelancers to develop clear insights into the organization’s vision and positioning.
They can then contribute effectively to developing a coherent marketing strategy that increases the
overall campaign’s performance.

1. Having clearly defined objectives and key result areas (KRAs)

The companies should craft well-defined, achievable objectives and KRAs for freelancers and
specialists (comparable to the approach used for regular employees). This approach provides
intense clarity to both the freelancers and the organization in terms expectations and what the term
“completed” would look like. Freelancers can also prioritize their tasks accordingly, optimizing the
productivity and efficiency of the marketing process.

1. Blending in the strengths and skill sets of the freelancers and the organization
Companies will benefit from following the strategy of effectively describing their strengths to the
clients because this would help in both motivating the freelancers and specialists, bringing an
appealing approach to the marketing processes, and helping them use their skill sets to bridge any
gap between the requirements and the organization’s capability.

1. Regularly reviewing the performance for lead generation campaigns

The ideal strategy that ensures consistent performance from the freelancer and a healthy work
relationship is to regularly review the performance of freelancers and the organization. This pre-
scheduled meeting will help identify the strengths and weaknesses of the freelancers and fill any
gaps from the organization’s side too. This approach would make a huge difference in the quality of
lead generation efforts, especially in the domain of technology marketing.
 1. Learning from the past
The companies need to carefully analyze and gather inputs from past successes, failures, and
overall experiences. This data provides them precious insights on the approaches that work well and
those that are best avoided. This will also help the organization to hone their techniques of utilizing
the contingent workforce to bring them optimal value.

Some of the most successful companies across the world operating across a wide range of
industries have indeed shifted their approach to developing a healthy balance between in-house and
freelance resources for generating intelligent content. This success formula has redefined their
positioning strategy in highly competitive markets. Effectively utilizing creative, freelance talents
proficient in intelligent content writing and marketing that suit the needs of new-age businesses is
probably a deciding factor between success and failure for most organizations. However, this crucial
factor is often overlooked. It is high time today’s firms understood the value of outsourcing content
marketing responsibilities to freelancers and specialized companies that would take their business
game to the next level.

Creduts: http://addkraft.com/marketing-outsourcing-working-with-freelancers-specialists-and-talents-
for-demand-generation/

Author: contact@addkraft.com