Have you ever wondered how to decide what to outsource in your online business? It's probably more difficult than doing so for an offline one. That's because so many Internet-based businesses also happen to be one-man-bands and, as a result, you end up doing all of it anyway. But you know as well as I do that you can't do it all. So how do you decide what to do?

Before you can do that, you need to understand the difference between core and non-core business. Core business is what your customers pay you for. It's your expertise. It's what you give them that enables them to solve their particular problem.

Non-core business is everything else. And to the extent possible, you should be doing only core business.

Obviously, that is the ideal, and online entrepreneurs - especially when they first start - seldom have the money to outsource as much as they would like.

Maybe you're in the same boat.

Even so, here are some guidelines that will help you to get started.

The number one activity that you need to do more than anything else is to create your own products. The most successful online entrepreneurs do. It's true that there are some people, called affiliates, who sell other people's products and who do very well at it, but they are few and far between.

Apart from the advantage of keeping all of the profits for yourself, another good reason to create your products is that you have complete control over the quality of the information. Have you ever bought a product that purported to deliver something really valuable, only to discover that it failed to live up to your expectations or that what was promised was blown out of all proportion? I certainly have.

When you create your own products, you can make sure that this doesn't happen to your customers.

There's another activity that you probably ought to do yourself, at least in the short term, and that's marketing. Writing articles for this directory is a case in point. Unless, and until, you've written a lot yourself, you won't really know how to write them in such a way as to make them attractive to your readers.

Once you do have the hang of it, then if you want to, you can create a template and outsource the activity.

The rest of what you do can be left for someone else; but that's a subject for another article.

I'm sure that you have thought, at one time or another, about how to create a variety of systems for your online business. And I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if you felt a bit daunted by the prospect of doing so. Here's a simple way to overcome this challenge.

What is a system?

A system is nothing more than detailed description of what you do in order to accomplish a particular process in your business. For example, when you create a new product, there are certain activities that you complete, not only to make the product, but also to upload it and distribute it.

The same thing is true of sales pages, shopping carts, web sites, and anything else you do to make your online business work.

How do you create a system?

Here is a simple approach that I'm sure will work for you.

Step 1 - write down everything that you know has to be done. Don't worry about putting it in the right order. Just get the information down on paper. I recommend that you write it out by hand. This may help you to think through the process more effectively.

If it helps, close your eyes, and imagine what the process looks like.

Step 2 - rearrange all of the tasks so that they occur in the order that is necessary to accomplish the entire process as quickly and accurately as possible. Systems are created to save you time; so make sure that your's are as efficient as you can make them.

Step 3 - test it. Don't assume that you've remembered everything. You'll find that if you don't test it while it's fresh in your mind, that you'll find it difficult to follow or that you might forget an important step. Of course, you won't know it's important until later when you are relying on the accuracy of the system. I've lost a whole day on occasion because I had forgotten how to do something that was important.

Step 4 - Test it again in a week. Don't go through the process for an entire week. Let it "get out of your system." Then go through it again. Ask yourself, is it as easy to follow as you expected?

Step 5 - Amend your system as necessary. Then print it and put it in a binder that you have for all of your other systems.