Offshore or Freelance Email Developers? Let’s Settle The Hiring Debate!

In a bid to tap into a global talent pool and expand their business’s horizons, onboarding offshore talent and freelancers has now become a standard practice for all industries across the globe. But, therein lies the ultimate debate. Which faction is more beneficial to your scheme of things? For your email marketing team, would you rather prefer hiring a developer from an offshore agency or a freelance developer? Well, we are here to lay your confusion to rest! 

In today’s article, we will walk you through the pros and cons of hiring offshore as well as freelance developers so that you can arrive at an informed conclusion. Gather along your teammates, too, as you sit down to read this. We’re sure there’s going to be a lot of back and forth between you all.

Freelance Email Developers

The rise of the gig economy over the last decade or so has resulted in freelancers finding a firm footing in the labor market. So, what are the benefits and challenges of getting them on deck? Let’s take a look.

Merits of hiring freelance email developers

• Flexibility: Freelancers are their own bosses, meaning they are not time-bound the way most salaried employees. That’s not to say they don’t put in the 8-9 hours of work as folks in regular offices. They do, too, just that they do not have to abide by any “9-5” schedule. As a result, they offer you a lot of flexibility. This becomes particularly convenient when you are working with someone who resides in a different time zone. You don’t necessarily have to communicate with them during the conventional “working hours” of their region. Instead, you can mutually fix a corridor that best suits the both of you. This way, you can establish a smooth workflow right from the get-go.
• No need for micro-management: Most freelancer developers are one-man armies. They acquire their own leads, prepare their own schedules, set their own deadlines, manage their own finances- you get the drift. So, once you brief them about your project requirements, you can rest assured that the next time they get back to you, it will be the final output (not counting the exchanges regarding clarifications which, of course, will be a due part of the process). Having your development in autopilot (essentially) saves you a lot of time, allowing you to channelize the same into other critical aspects such as automation, testing, customer retention, and the like. 
• Easy termination on grounds of dissatisfaction: With freelance or contractual developers, there’s rarely a requirement to issue a termination notice in advance. Neither by the freelancer nor by the client. If at any point in time either of you feels things are not working out, you can immediately voice it out, settle dues (if any), and terminate the contract. There is no unnecessary time lost in chasing protocol.
• Non-involvement of intermediaries: You deal directly with them. Be it briefing the project requirements or discussing financials, it all takes place between you and the freelancer in question. Subsequently, this can spare you from a world of chaos and miscommunication. 

Demerits of hiring freelance email developers

• No assurance of quality: Freelancers often tend to juggle multiple clients (and projects( simultaneously). In such a scenario, expecting them to devote singular attention to your work is tough. At the end of the day, it is just one more contract for them. There’s no particular incentive for them to pay extra attention to your job. On top of that, should your payscale, howsoever reasonable it might be for the task at hand, happen to be less competitive than their other existing ones, you will automatically be pushed to the bottom of their priority list. As a result, there’s a good chance of the quality being compromised.
• Lack of additional inputs or perspective: Freelancers work in isolation. So, when they start work on your campaign, they will shape it as per their own singular vision. While this is not necessarily a problem, it does rob your project of a host of resourceful insights and perspectives that only strike one while working alongside a group of like-minded individuals. 
• Difficulty in picking the right talent: Everyone’s freelancing these days. This means that you have a great many options at your disposal to attend to your requirements. But not everyone’s skillset will be up to the mark, right? One casual glance at any top online freelance marketplaces will tell you that there’s no dearth of fraudsters out there; rank amateurs masquerading as industry experts. Let’s say you manage to weed them all out effectively, leaving you to contend with a pool of qualified and credible individuals only. Well, that’s no lesser headache either. You’ll have to prepare your own shortlist from that pool and then interview each one of them personally to understand who’s the ideal fit for your job.
• Lesser viability for long-term projects: Since freelancers have shifting priorities, hiring them for long-term projects is not quite feasible. Additionally, entrusting such a project to someone who operates in isolation wouldn’t be a very wise decision either.

Offshore Email Developers

Businesses are turning to offshoring, now more than ever, to tap into flexible and distributed workforces and augment their core teams in the process. But, what are the pros and cons associated with hiring offshore email developers? Let’s take a look.

Merits of hiring offshore email developers

• Access to a global talent pool: The main reason why more and more businesses are looking beyond setting up in-house teams is that it limits their talent-hunting by a significant degree. While building an in-house email team, you are left with no choice but to recruit from among the resources available to you in the location you are based out of. Subsequently, this keeps you from obtaining the best asset for your investment. When you seek out offshore agencies, however, you give yourself the scope of selecting top-tier talent from diverse corners of the world. What’s more, you also get to hire specialized professionals for niche fields. All this culminates in you outshining your competitors.
• Reduced costs: What are the costs involved with building an in-house email team, you ask? At the very least, office infrastructure costs, employee salaries and training expenses, and software installation charges. By the time you add up to the rest, you’re sure to spot a massive dent in your wallet. This is where offshoring comes into the picture. When you onboard email talent from offshore agencies, all you have to pay for are their services. Yes, that’s all. No other hidden costs. Some companies also look to recruit resources from offshore agencies located in countries where labor costs are significantly lower compared to theirs. That helps them save a few additional bucks too.
• Faster turnaround: Offshore agencies have readily available certified professionals. That means you save the time that’s usually spent in onboarding new recruits as well as training them to the requisite level. Moreover, whatever instruction or information you have to share with your offshore developers, you do so directly. Similarly, if they have to seek out any clarifications, they directly contact you rather than going through layers of hierarchy as one normally would in a conventional office set-up. Delivering projects well before deadlines, thus, becomes customary while working with offshore developers.
• Hire as per your requirements: While hiring candidates for an in-house team, you get them on deck on a full-time basis, irrespective of your needs. Say you have landed a new short-term project, and the team you have currently is not cut out for this work. So, what do you do? Go about assembling another in-house team? Swipe that bead of sweat from your forehead, we have just the right advice for you- hire a certified email talent part-time from an offshore agency. If you like the work of said talent and want to recruit them full-time, you can very well do so. 

Demerits of hiring offshore email developers

• Language and culture barriers: When you recruit people from all over the world, you may encounter language and culture barriers. If you are not tactful while resolving them, the resulting miscommunication can severely impede your work. The best way to overcome this challenge is to impart dedicated cultural sensitivity training to the staff responsible for coordinating with offshore talent. 
• Lack of control: Relegating your job to an external agency is always a bit of a gamble. You might not get your vision realised to its fullest, not receive periodic updates, or fail to align the timelines of the remaining modules with the one being handled by the offshore team. If you want to steer clear of this, search for agencies that provide resources who report directly to you.
• Confidentiality scares: In the course of hiring offshoring resources, you also make them privy to sensitive information such as your market research, trade secrets, intellectual property, and the like. If you don’t have an airtight non-disclosure or confidentiality agreement in place, you can’t possibly stop this data from getting compromised. Fleshing out a detailed outsourcing contract is key to tiding over this challenge. 

Wrapping It Up

Well, our verdict is something like this- judging from the comparative study carried out above, it can be firmly said that there’s no clear winner to be found. Whether you should hire freelance or offshore developers ultimately boils down to your current requirements. And that is bound to vary from one situation to another. For example, if you have a short-term project, hiring a freelancer is a better bet. On the other hand, if the work is long-term, you shouldn’t think twice before approaching an offshore agency. 

Since while onboarding offshore talent, you deal with a structured agency, one can argue that things tend to be more hassle-free. Additionally, there’s a greater probability of finding diverse talent over there too. That said, if you have strong managerial skills and the patience to scour through freelance marketplaces to pick up the right talent for your job, you’re good to go. When you have to make this call, we hope that the points discussed above help you arrive at the correct decision.