NO!

OK, so saving IT dollars does technically save you money for your company if you look at the immediate cost.  Unfortunately that's where most decisions stop.  "Gosh, we're spending $2,000.00 a month on help desk, network administration, hardware, power...  Let's cut that to $500/month and we'll be saving $18,000.00 each year!"  Sounds enticing doesn't it?  Unfortunately you'll probably lose half of that due to wasting time on figuring out simple help desk issues, and you'll probably have some sort of large IT system error that costs you somewhere in the range of what you thought you were saving by cutting IT costs.

Instead of simply cutting cost by reducing services look at these factors on how you can reduce your IT costs to save money, but keep your company well supported and on track to reach its goals.

• Analyze your hardware.  Do you have more than you need, or is it outdated?  It could be costing you to have older hardware supported, repaired, or failing at your company.  Check with your IT company to make sure that the equipment does everything you need, and that it will survive until you are ready to invest in new equipment.  If you aren't sure what your hardware is capable of consult with your IT company, or department, to utilize it to its full capacity.  If you have a server but are still storing documents on your PC you should probably use what you have invested so much money in.
• Use Web Based Software.  (Wall Street Journal)Installing software "locally" (on individual machines) can be costly.  Using an online service eliminates the need to install software on your computer, is accessible from anywhere, and increases the availability, and often the efficiency, of your employees.
• Check your work-flow.  Many offices are taking unnecessary steps, and slowing down their processes, without even knowing it.  A good IT company, or department, can help you identify areas in which you can improve on work-flow through your technology.  Utilize your hardware, software, and goals to create a system that eliminates unnecessary steps, gathers needed information, and creates a system that will increase efficiency and decrease costs.
• Managed Services.  (CRN.com) It sounds odd, but there aren't many Managed Service Providers using the term "managed services." Rather, they market themselves as "outsourced IT departments." The terminology might be complex, but the concept is not: helping customers lower costs by monitoring and managing their IT infrastructure. In most cases, customers pay the MSP a recurring fee to take care of their IT needs. Because MSPs have more control over both their resources and the customer, the end user's costs are typically less than the traditional break-fix model.
  
  "It's pretty easy. We take responsibility for their network. My analogy is if you had a mechanic living in your garage, your car would run forever," said B.J. Farmer, CEO of CITOC Inc., a Houston-based MSP.

So before you put your IT budget on the chopping block invest some time and money into analyzing your hardware, software, work-flow, and IT services.  If you see an area that can be improved on consult with a local IT company that you trust, and find some areas that will save you money upfront and increase efficiency for your organization.

Online registration is not just a convenient tool for organizations to utilize; it’s a service your customers are expecting.  Think of how many times you’ve wanted to register for something, but you didn’t because you had to do something, no matter how simple, other than just filling out an online form.  I myself am guilty, and the Parks and Rec. volleyball team that never had a chance will never know the glory of victory because of it!

I want to help you see the benefits of an online registration system and educate you why you need to have this as an option.

Convenience:

The convenience factor of online registration is mind boggling.  With a web-based system your registration is available 24/7, anywhere there is web access.  You can send out emails with links directly to registration.  Your registration can be right on your website.  Your registration can be paired up with online shopping (think sports registration, travel, or event merchandise).  You receive immediate confirmation with details on what you just registered for, and it’s available for you to reference whenever you need it.

It’s truly amazing how convenient online registration is for your customers, but it’s even better for you.

With a good online registration system your registrant’s information will go directly into your database.  Now most online registration systems are just that, a registration system, but a management system that creates events and helps you run your program should give you the ability to access user information whenever you need it, make notes, market directly to them, even sign them up for recurring events if they request.  Without sounding too much like a sales pitch for our own registration system, ours does all of those tasks, and more.  Other conveniences worth mentioning are receiving instant feedback about how many people are registered, and being able to monitor your event’s registrations from wherever you are. 

Cost Savings:

While it may not save much money for your registrants, probably only a stamp, it will save you a lot of money, most of it being in the form of time saved.  Online systems that have an integrated database, such as ours, giving you access to registrant info.  The time it takes to file registrations is cut down to zero, it’s all automated so you don’t have to enter any data or file any papers.  You’re not using paper or paying for postage.  Automated messages save you time on follow up and confirmation.  Online registration reduces the amount of input errors, so no time spent fixing misread forms or explaining to people why there were registered for something other than they thought they marked down.  Start up cost is relatively low too.  Being able to pass on the cost of online systems to your registrants means you don’t have to pay to file data, pay for a huge program, or pay to create a new spreadsheet for every event you have. 

Reporting:

Most every organization needs reporting in one form or another.  Using online registration gives you real time reports so you can analyze trends in registration, income, participation, and other useful fields.  The access to the reports can be made public or kept private, but they’re accessible and available when you need them rather than having to sift through all of your registration forms, spreadsheets, or billing statements to create a useful report.

System Support and Security:

Whatever your system is, and whoever provides it, it should be supported by the provider.  If you are the one creating your registration system you have to figure out how to fix any issue that comes up, but if you’re using an online registration from, let’s just say us for fun, you are provided full support to address any issues or utilize any functionality that you aren’t aware of.  Along with the system’s support, your database should be kept in a secure location that you can only access if you have permission.  No worrying about paper documents or spreadsheets accidentally being removed, destroyed, or stolen.

Increased Attendance and Easier Marketing:

I know it sounds too good to be true, but by simply providing an online registration option you are increasing your availability and your odds that people will attend your event.  If more people attend it generally relates to positive results for your business, meaning cash, data or whatever it is you’re looking for.  And how about marketing to specific groups?  That’s made easy by being able to categorize your registrants for future marketing efforts.  If you utilize email marketing you can automate your marketing program to interact with them, saving you time and money. 

I hope this simple, poorly written, list of reasons to utilize online registration starts your journey towards increasing your abilities, saving you time, and simplifying your process.  But if that’s not enough info to get you excited to start thinking about providing an option for online registration feel free to email me, Cameron, at ITsolutions@intertechpro.com, and I’ll happily continue this conversation with you further.

Everyone has probably had a less than perfect experience with IT support, or at least heard of one.  A lot of you have probably seen the Saturday Night Live skit for "Nick Burns, Computer Guy" (http://www.hulu.com/watch/19050/saturday-night-live-nick-burns) This is the stereotype that most people put together with you IT support.  We are working hard to make Nick Burns be a joke to the past, and no longer a reinforcement of a negative experience.

Here's what most people think of when they think IT support:

·     Geeks.  By Wiki definition:  "A peculiar or otherwise odd person, especially one who is perceived to be overly obsessed with one or more things including those of intellectuality, electronics, etc."

·     They don't have much real world experience, so they can't relate what they are doing to you, because they only know computer talk.

·     Not concerned with the wellbeing of others, but only getting the task at hand taken care of.

·     Uncompromising with the way to get things done, extremely structured.  Even if it seems like there is an easier way to get things done, they do it a certain way, every time.

The truth is most IT support personnel aren't like that at all.  When you call Tech Support for a lot of companies people are just tired of dealing with the same problem over and over again, also they have to go through a certain series of reporting in order to track what has been done, even though it doesn't make sense to the person receiving the help.

We pride ourselves here on doing things a bit differently, and hopefully IT support people will start to notice how we help our customers out, and we'll eventually change the stereotype.  Yes, we are "geeks" but not by the definition of the word.  We do have a large interest in IT related items because that's where we make our living, but we make sure it's not the only part of our lives.  By having real world experiences we can relate to our customers and explain what we are doing, and what needs to be done, in a way that doesn't alienate our customers.  It's much better for someone to know what they are paying for than to just trust us that we're going to fix everything and it won't happen again.  Our number one concern is the wellbeing of others, especially in the business world.  We understand that time is money, and for that reason we want to make sure we eliminate any problems that come up, and minimize any that potentially could arise in the future.  This might take an extra minute to walk through the problem with the customer, but in the end they will know how to eliminate the issue if it comes back, or how to prevent it from re-occurring.  Being a small company we have the freedom to directly asses an issue, we don't have to go through a long corporate structured process.  By doing this you know we're working in the most efficient way, and you're only paying for the problem to be fixed, not for getting a run-around.

IT Support Personnel have a long way to go to improve their public image, but we're making sure we can put a dent in it one customer at a time.

I've had several meetings around the area with mid sized companies and I've found that a lot of people have no idea what they are paying for with their Network Administrators.  Because of this I've simply copied the Wiki for "Network Administrator" here for you to see the basic overview of the job.  If your Network Administrator isn't doing the majority of the things mentioned it's time for you to start looking elsewhere.  Our Network Admin crew does a fantastic job fulfilling all the job descriptions here as well as providing it at a price that can't be beaten.  Give me a call or send me an email to find out more on the pricing.

From Wikipedia:

Network administrator is a modern profession responsible for the maintenance of computer hardware and software that comprises a computer network. This normally includes the deployment, configuration, maintenance and monitoring of active network equipment. A related role is that of the network specialist, or network analyst, who concentrates on network design and security.

The Network Administrator is usually the highest level of technical/network staff in an organization and will rarely be involved with direct user support. The Network Administrator will concentrate on the overall health of the network, server deployment, security, and ensuring that the network connectivity throughout a company's LAN/WAN infrastructure is on par with technical considerations at the network level of an organization's hierarchy. Network Administrators are considered Tier 3 support personnel that only work on break/fix issues that could not be resolved at the Tier1 (helpdesk) or Tier 2 (desktop/network technician) levels.

Depending on the company, the Network Administrator may also design and deploy networks. However, these tasks may be assigned to a Network Engineer should one be available to the company.

The actual role of the Network Administrator will vary from company to company, but will commonly include activities and tasks such as network address assignment, assignment of routing protocols and routing table configuration as well as configuration of authentication and authorization – directory services. It often includes maintenance of network facilities in individual machines, such as drivers and settings of personal computers as well as printers and such. It sometimes also includes maintenance of certain network servers: file servers, VPN gateways, intrusion detection systems, etc.

Network specialists and analysts concentrate on the network design and security, particularly troubleshooting and/or debugging network-related problems. Their work can also include the maintenance of the network's authorization infrastructure, as well as network backup systems.

The administrator is responsible for the security of the network and for assigning IP addresses to the devices connected to the networks. Assigning IP addresses gives the subnet administrator some control over the professional who connects to the subnet. It also helps to ensure that the administrator knows each system that is connected and who personally is responsible for the system.

So there you have it.  Double check to make sure you have a Network Administrator that is doing what they should be, and if you feel you need improvement in that area, or you just want to save money give us a call.

A major component to your organizations success is work flow and efficiency, and a major part of that is having the right computer support.  A technical partner that fits your needs is an obvious choice, but how do you sift through the seemingly endless amount of providers? 

What is valuable about your company's IT?  What isn't working for you and what is?  Finding out what you need should eliminate a large majority of who you are looking for.  If a company just provides web design and hosting it could be a great fit for you, but don't expect it to cover your programming needs as well as network administration tasks.  On the other hand if you're looking for back end support a hard core programmer could be lacking in the design end. 

What's the support company's history?  You can find out a lot about a company by its history.  If they have shining reviews from their entire client list you can trust that they're going to continue to deliver as they have in the past.  If they have a very large client base it can be good for your company because of their capabilities to service multiple customers, but will you get the same service as a small company, probably not.  Also ask if they will be able to handle your business's growth, or if their intentions are to help facilitate growth or just to maintain a certain level.

The most important thing is do you connect?  Businesses are built on successful relationships where both parties have the same goal.  Whether your company is looking to grow, maintain, re-work its image, or even possibly shrink, there is a company out there that will fit your needs.

For a free consult send iTP an email here to see if we are the right fit for you.