Outsourcing to Latin America
Outsourcing to Latin America
A short guide on how to nearshore to LatAm and what to look out for
Welcome Avatar! End of year is kicking in and it shows - it has been an embarrassing 2 weeks hiatus since my last post. Today we will discuss the wonders of outsourcing, and not to Bangladesh or India, but to your same timezone in Latam (if you’re based in the US, that is).
Timezones
If you’re based in the Western Hemisphere, timezones in Latam make way more sense than outsourcing to India, Pakistan or Bangladesh. Also culturally, LatAm is a lot more aligned with the States than India, despite the fact that many Indians are native English speakers and English is less common in LatAm.
Most timezones range from EST +1 to PST (Mexico), so that’s almost a perfect sync with the US timezones.
Argentina does not have daylight savings, so timezone will either be EST +2 or EST +1, based on daylight savings in the US.
I’ve worked a lot with Venezuelans and Colombians as well (mainly developers and sales reps), and those timezones are also perfect for the US.
Brazil vs Argentina
After living in Brazil and being a sales rep for the Brazilian market for an international company with frequent visits to São Paulo, there are some interesting dynamics at play when looking for talent.
I’ve worked with freelancers from Rio, São Paulo and Curitiba, and all had very high development standards. English tends to be a bit less frequent than in Argentina, so I did most of the communication directly in Portuguese.
One thing to keep in mind when looking for talent in Brazil is the following:
The pool of talent is smaller percentage wise vs Argentina;
More experienced people will be a lot more expensive;
If person speaks English, pay will be a lot higher than in Argentina;
That being said, if you focus on the Brazilian market or Portuguese speakers: you HAVE to hire in Brazil. It is a market of its own here in LatAm, much like the US is its own market, and in that sense it is a bubble island where 99% could care less about dynamics in other regions, since they can survive on their own internal consumption.
This is also one of the reasons people do not per se need to speak English in Brazil, simply not that useful compared to Argentina where you have to look for opportunities outside the country.
Freelancers from Argentina, Venezuela and Colombia are great options to service most of LatAm and the US, but I wouldn’t hire them to do marketing for Brazil, unless they have lived in Brazil and/or speak Portuguese (this is a requirement, and I’m not talking Portuñol).
Language
Probably the most important thing to look for depending on your business model, is to hire people with basic or advanced English. If people have to be client facing or doing Zoom calls, you do not want to hire a contractor that only speaks very basic English.
For devs this is less of a requirement, but most devs will already speak English to some degree just because so much of the coding languages have English references and resources. Still, if you yourself don’t speak Spanish or Portuguese, you have to be able to communicate with them so they should still have basic written English.
Autist note: One market that is ripe for absolute disruption is Spanish marketing in the United States, and Portuguese to a lesser extent. So if you’re focusing on Spanish speakers in the US, hiring a team from LatAm makes total sense.
Process
Ideally you publish a job post, screen and shortlist candidates based on CV / track record, and then conduct an interview.
If you speak Spanish (or Portuguese for Brazil), you will be able to interview a lot more people and probably lower costs if you don’t need an English speaker.
Keep in mind that it is very normal for devs here to list projects they worked on within an agency (so if you see a site they made with an agency logo footer, just ask about their role in the development process).
My preferred countries are:
Argentina (devs, sales reps, marketing)
Venezuela (devs)
Colombia (devs, sales reps, marketing)
Brazil (all, mainly focused on BR market)
No experience with Mexico, so cannot comment
If you decide to work with a bigger team in one location, I can recommend travelling down, meeting in person and make sure to have 1 or 2 managers responsible to you that manage the rest of the team.
Important cultural point is that out of sight tends to be out of mind. This is more of an issue with LatAm than it is in Europe or in the US. I recommend frequent calls to make sure everyone is aligned, and a clear tracking system for tasks with clear deadlines (Trello, Asana or whatever you prefer).
Platforms
Where to look? This is well known, but platforms like Upwork, Remoteok and a few others are probably best. Here is a short list to start your journey:
International (freelancers)
These platforms are best if you’re looking for a couple of individuals for very specific roles (freelancers), could be VA, marketing, dev, etc.
Upwork.com (probably one of the biggest, more expensive in general but better for seeing track record) - personally I always use UpWork first. The reason I like Upwork is the fact that track record is really easy to verify.
weworkremotely.com
freelancer.com
remote.co
remoteok.com
Local / International (agency)
These platforms are best for bigger software/dev projects that need a full team:
Devlane - Boutique nearshore software development company headquartered in Uruguay, with a presence across LATAM.
BairesDev - more expensive but great for sourcing tech talent in Argentina - very good sourcers
Simplex Software - boutique software development company from Argentina.
Acid Labs - Based in Chile with a team of 80+ collaborators, providing services to companies of diverse sizes
Ceiba Software - Colombian software development company with more than 400 members in its team
Flux IT - Custom app development from Argentina
Huenei IT Services - Argentinian software company for custom technology-based services (350+ team)
Octobot - Small company based in Uruguay (team of 25+ professionals), for highly-specialized projects
Tekton Labs - Based in Peru, for cutting-edge technologies like AI, machine learning, blockchain, and more traditional dev.
Local freelancers (Arg)
If you really look to hire fully local, these are local Argentine platforms for freelancers:
https://www.bumeran.com.ar/empleos-busqueda-trabajo-remoto.html (if you really want to deep dive and lower costs, this is the biggest platform in Argentina. Keep in mind that you will receive a lot of junk as well, and payments might be an issue)
https://www.zonajobs.com.ar/ (second biggest job platform, similar to Bumeran)
https://ar.computrabajo.com/ (third biggest)
Payments
Intl. Bank account - If the freelancer has a US bank account, that is the easiest scenario, but most will not. Some might have an EU bank account, but just count on none of those options being available for most.
It is better to streamline payments all with 1 solution, this is easier for you to track and it gives you a nice centralized location for all your freelancer payouts.
Deel.com - The clients that I work with from the States in terms of helping them set up a local team, all use deel.com. It’s the easiest way where the received funds can be sent to whatever the freelancer wishes.
Payoneer - Some freelancers work with payoneer (higher fees), and some might accept crypto (ideal scenario), but not all are familiar with crypto payments. If you have the patience to walk them through it, it could be beneficial for them, specially in Argentina where many cuevas directly accept crypto in exchange for the blue dollar rate.
Other - Other payment options are Western Union (similar blue rate, but there is an annual max amount and it takes a lot of time for freelancers to collect, waiting in line etc.) and Wise.com. From wise you can directly transfer USD to Argentine USD accounts, but in those cases the Argentine central bank will withhold 35%+ in taxes on the final amount, and the bank will require a bunch of paperwork to prove that the freelancer has the right to that deposit.
PayPal is a no go, since Argentines generally cannot withdraw from PayPal unless they have a US bank account. Besides, PayPal should be avoided at all costs just because of their NGMI policies.
Let me know in the comments if you have any specific questions about outsourcing to LatAm or if you think I missed something.
That’s it, see you in the Jungle folks!