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Have you ever considered outsourcing? I’ve got a team from the Philippines whom I’ve been working with for 9 years now, and they’re awesome at what they do. In this podcast, I’m going to talk about why you should consider outsourcing to the Philippines too. Tune in to learn more about outsourcing!
Nate, we’ve talked about outsourcing before but you’re talking specifically about the Philippines so much. Why is that? Yeah, we’re going to talk about that. Why not hire people in India or China or Brazil? Over the Philippines? If you’ve watched even one second of any of these Nate WoodBury, “Be the Hero, Nate” videos along with me, Scott Christopher. Not a hero but a pretty decent guy. You probably know that Nate outsources almost everything you’re watching except us to the Philippines. That is correct. And we’ve talked about it a couple of times. But in this particular episode we’re going to get even a little more granular as we talk about why Nate uses the Philippines really exclusively. And you’ve never been in any other country for outsourcing. Yeah, I learned… That’s correct. Well, I’ve done some project-based things in other countries but but not a full-time employee. All my full-time employees have always been in the Philippines. And I was taught the reasons why and I’m going to share some of those reasons and also share my experience. And I’ve heard of other people that have hired full-time employees in places like India, great people and in China. But some of the disadvantages that they’ve experienced.
So, the first advantage I want to talk about is… And this goes back to a great benefit of all outsourcing is the cost. Comparing it to all the other countries, the cost of living in the Philippines is is smaller. If you’re going to hire one person in the Philippines, another person in India, you’re going to pay a lot less in the Philippines. Interesting. There’s a…If you look up the statistics of the minimum wage, it’s different by city across the Philippines. But some some of the bigger cities like Manila will have a little bit higher minimum wage, smaller cities on, you know, other islands will be lower. But it ranges in in the realm about dollar 50 to 250 per hour. If that’s translated to US dollars. And that’s their minimum wage that they’re saying you got to at least pay this amount. So, that’s the amount that their government is is that the minimum out that they need to pay. And obviously, when you’re outsourcing, laws are different because we’re U.S and and whatnot but that’s it’s kind of a cool statistic. Do you find that one… It sounds like you’re mostly paying on a sort of a monthly basis of monthly salary. Yeah. I would set it up just like you would as if you had employees here in the United States. And the way that I’d do it, if you’re curious, is I do just pay once a month. So, we have all of our hours recorded. Typically, it’s 160 hours in a month. And then on a specific day in the following month, it’s pay day and that’s when they get there. And you do direct deposits or something or… Right now, it’s PayPal. There’s been different tools that I’ve used in the past. But I’m just using PayPal. Huh, interesting. PayPal’s fee structure is actually just recently changed. Where now it’s an automatic five bucks even if you’re sending to friends or family at five dollar fee. So, there’s other ways that I could look into. So, costs compare very favorably if you’re in the Philippines. As far as you know, it’s right down there. Let’s move on to benefit number 2. And that is language. They speak English. Yeah, English is obviously a second language but it’s a real high second language. They… All their street signs are in English. There’s… I guess there’s a lot of dialects and whatnot. And so, English is kind of the common… That’s the one that unifier that everybody… Yeah, yeah. Well and it was, you know, the history of the Philippine people… I don’t know what specifically, but I do know that a few years ago Spain was kind of the dominator. They came along and took over the Philippines. So, you still get a lot of Spanish names I’ve noticed with people. Jose Luis, Miguel, Florida whatever. But then America, boom! Beat Spain. Get out and so English became the de facto. Like you’re saying, kind of universal language. Did I get that right? Do you know? That sounds great to me. Doesn’t it? Yeah. It’s right. It sounds good. Yeah. But now and then America being America said, “Hey, you’re free. Be the Philippines.” But let us outsource to you now and then. Sort of as payback. And the quality of their English is great. Yes. If I were to have somebody write “sales copy”, that is challenging. You need to find you need to find somebody who understands that Cells Psychology to build or to write that. But to write the descriptions for videos, to do keyword research for me and all that. I mean, to communicate with my clients. Well, to even go through hours of this kind of footage and understand what in the world we’re talking aboot — that’s Canadian. And there’s… But you’re not Canadian. No, I’m not. But there’s there’s stories that I’ve heard of people who have hired somebody in India. And while that person is extremely skilled and very well educated and has a big background and whatnot, you’ll say something and say, “Do you understand?” And they’ll say “Yes, I heard you.” But they don’t… They, there’s… There’s something lost. They’ll say “Yes.” But that’s because they heard your words but they didn’t understand. They received you but they don’t perceive. And that apparently happens quite a lot. It’s really never happened. Yeah, the language is not a barrier with the Philippines. So, India, no. Philippines, yes. If there was a World Cup for where we want to outsource, Philippines takes the cake. Alright.
So, another great advantage and reason for the Philippines. They are very highly educated in all things digital, all things computer related. Yeah. Yeah, all my all my team and I can’t say all but most of my team, all have degrees in, you know, some computer science or something like that. They’re very well trained. Even though it’s a third world country and they live in… How we sure its third world? Are we confident in that classification? Yes. Okay. I don’t know what the requirements are but I’m… Yes. Because it kind of seems second world to me. But… I don’t even know if there is a second world. Oh, I think they’d… I think there is. Yeah. Somebody in the comments below. There’s well… I mean, there’s a first world countries, there’s third world then there’s definitely seconds in there. But I don’t know. I would say it’s definitely third world. It’s neither here nor there. Back to topic. The reason we want to hire people in the Philippines is because they’re highly educated. Yeah. Especially anything that’s related to the computer. And that’s the type of stuff that’s easiest to outsource. Anyway, let’s move on to the next one I have here. Their culture is really, really kind and respectful. It was a bit kind of awkward at first for them to call me Sir all the time. And to… What some of the things that they say? I’m used to it now. But like they say, you know, kind Sir and stuff like that. And they’re just very, very polite. I mean, we can be… They probably wouldn’t make a joke about a World Cup of outsourcing and say, “Boom! Philippines wins.” Just like I did with my brash background. They are respectful. Yeah, Americans can be none… We could be disrespectful. Oh, the ugly American is not just a saying. Yes. It’s sitting right next to me. Filipinos as a culture as a whole, I found to be very kind, very polite. Give-you-the-shirt-off-their-back type of people. Yeah. Absolutely. Alright. So, this one was surprising to me and even though I was taught it, I didn’t believe it. But now I’ve experienced it. And they are not entrepreneurial. Now, why is that an advantage or a good thing. That’s a good thing when you’re hiring an employee. So, I obviously love entrepreneurship and for all of our viewers here, I want you to succeed and I want you to be entrepreneurs. And any of my team they’re editing these videos, I want to help you be an entrepreneur. But the reason that I am calling this an advantage is that Filipinos are not entrepreneurial is I don’t ever have to train my competition. I don’t have to worry about that. Yeah, I love that. In other words, you’re not worried that they’re going to leave and start their own competing business, yeah. Yeah it was it was a big concern like, “Oh man, I’m training them how to do all my secrets.” You know, this is how I create the videos or this is how back in the day it was website design. When I had this concern. So, i was like… Because I had created a new way of doing website design that was way more efficient. I thought all the other web design companies on earth were stupid. I’m like, “How come they’re not doing this?” I figured this out. So, I was training my team. This is exactly how we do it. We follow these 4 steps and this what I’m selling, this is the price and this is design the website. Create it for me. And I just thought, “Well, what if they create another website and start marketing this?” Right. But it never happened. Long story short, it never happened. And now, that thought doesn’t even cross my mind because that’s not what they want. They’re not interested in becoming the competition. They really want that safety and security. If you can up… Here’s one kind of a I note. The Philippines is great for full-time, long-term employment. If you just have a project, such as you just need a website designed, you’re not going to hire an employee to design your website. Because then what are they going to do when your website is done, right? But if you have ongoing articles that are posted your website, their blog posts or you’re doing ongoing video editing, that’s a full-time position and that’s obviously a great person to hire for a full-time position. Makes sense.
So, yeah. I mean, the next point is is related. It’s it’s loyalty. I mean, I’m thinking of a couple team members in my mind right now that are so loyal. They’re always sharing ideas. They’re thinking of ways to grow and benefit my company. And I love it. In a previous video, where we talked about some of the disadvantages of outsourcing. And I shared a story, it was one of my employees that approached me and said, “Hey this is what I think is happening.” And I was just so grateful and… Blew the whistle. Yeah. My team are very loyal. I’m really, really appreciative of that. Yeah. Well, now you know why. I gave you the back story. So, tell them what you’re going to say. Well, they love Americans. See? Now, why do they love Americans everyone? Because we liberated them and gave them their country back from Spain. Interesting. Yeah. I mean… When was it? I don’t know. 50’s? 40’s? 50’s? Yeah. It wasn’t long ago. It might have been earlier than that. But I mean, it’s the Spanish-American war was as I recall over the Philippines. So, if this is correct or incorrect, comment below because we want to know. I want know. I went to college decades ago and I remember this because I used to live in Spain. And I knew a lot of Filipinos in Spain. But now, I know a lot of Filipinos in America or Filipinos who are just staying in the Philippines because they’re free. Which is great. So, that’s why they love Americans. And it’s something that I’ve experienced. And that it’s a status symbol when… To work for an American. When they can say, “Yeah, my boss is American. They brag. They use it as a bragging right. It’s pretty cool. Like I had one one employee that was telling me that, “Yeah, I was telling all my friends that I worked for American. And they’re asking. They are all excited, asking about it and wanted to find how…” You know who would ever say that? They’re proud to work for an American? Who? A Canadian. That’s all I’m saying. It just comes to mind. This is a really humble, good, people. We like them. Alright. For the last point I’m actually going to share a resource that makes it so easy to hire people in the Philippines. It’s virtualassistanttool.com. I’ll put a link down in the description for it. The reason I list that here as the benefit because other countries don’t have resources available like this one to make it so easy. Really because you’ve got a culture of people that want to work for Americans. And so, there’s a whole database of people on the virtualassistanttool.com that you can go. And there’s a couple hundred thousand people there that are really hungry, really educated and you can filter it down and find the skill set that exactly matches what you’re looking for. So, it makes it really easy. And this is obviously applicable in any industry, for any level of entrepreneurialship. You don’t have to be doing YouTube videos to be able to jump on virtualassistanttool.com and find potential outsourceese in the Philippines. Alright, so we had a a decent sized list there but there’s a lot more things that we could have touched on there. What are some other reasons why you think the Philippines is a superior place to hire people. You might have to do some internet research for that one. Yeah. Because if you don’t have an opinion… Yeah if you don’t have an opinion, then we don’t want to hear it. At all. And I will put the link down in the description for the virtualassistanttool.com