As a small e-business owner, you should know about Craig's List because it is a great resource to find inexpensive help to grow your e-business. While much of the site is occupied with buying and selling of used household items, roommate searches, personal ads, and chitchat, there are great business resources there also.



I would like to direct your attention to the section on Craiglist called "Gigs," which can be a gold mine of resources for an e-business owner on a beer budget. Gigs are simply postings of help-wanted ads. You can post advertisements for help in areas where you might need it to grow your e-business. Because the jobs are usually project-based and short-term, you will be able to avoid hiring full-time employees and also pay discounted rates to the contractors you engage who value their flexibility, are unemployed, or who live in lower-cost cities in the United States and other Countries.

If you are having trouble finding help, utilizing Craigslist for help can be a very effective and cheap way of finding a contract employee. There is no cost for placing an ad. Ads can be targeted to specific cities or worldwide. Craigslist receives more than 4 billion page views per month. So, the potential to reach a wide audience is also there.

Outsourcing is becoming a more popular option for small and large businesses, and Craigslist is leading the way in connecting businesses with contract employees. Most business are becoming more aware that this is the best place to find highly skill contract employee. It is much more economical to pay a contract employee, because with a full-time employee companies are usually required to offer benefits such as social security, medical coverage, and workers' compensation. They are not required to offer these benefits to a contract employee

I'm always amazed at the quality of people who respond to my ads. I've had people that I thought were over qualified. But, be prepared to get some off topic and nutty responses also.

Computer Gigs is the most useful category for finding e-business help, although Creative Gigs and Writing Gigs may all be useful for your e-business. I recently posted an ad looking for someone to create a Web site banner for me, and I quickly began receiving dozens of e-mail response within 30 minutes of posting the ad. I received a ton of e-mails from college students and people located in India. If you are clear in your ad about what you are willing to pay and what you need, you will be able to quickly find cheap help for almost anything. I paid $15 for the banner and received it 2 days later. Do you realize how much I would have paid for that banner if I had hired a professional?

This advice is true even if you do not live in a large city covered by Craiglist, as long as you are in need of services where the results can be delivered electronically via some type of digital file that can be sent to you by e-mail or FTP or downloaded from a Web page. Copywriting, web design, and research services all quality.

As one of my e-business pal says: "Don't think you can do it all. In a small business, if you insist on doing everything yourself, you are going to run out of hours in the day and your business will suffer."