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The general thought many business owners have concerning IT support is that there is a single cost to fix technology related issues (cost of their vendor to fix the problem).   They believe money will be saved by paying a few hundred dollars here and there when things go wrong on a time and materials basis instead of a monthly fee to prevent issues from occurring in the first place.  This thinking has proved itself to be wrong in many cases.  In fact, many business owners fail to realize…

It is more expensive for you to call us than it is for us to respond!

Let me explain.  Let’s say your business has 15 employees and each costs the company around $20 an hour to employ.  For every hour of downtime you experience your hard costs are $300.  So if it took your IT vendor 1 hour to respond to your call and another hour to fix the problem your hard costs would be roughly $125 for the service call and $600 in lost productivity (plus an unknown number in soft costs considering lost sales, angry clients, etc).  So this one issue alone cost you approximately $725.   As you can see the cost of the support call at $125 was much cheaper than the cost of lost productivity at $600.  

So what can business owners do to protect themselves against downtime and minimize risk?  The answer is Flat Rate Managed IT Services.  

So what are Managed IT Services?

Managed services are defined as monitoring, maintaining, troubleshooting and upgrading your IT infrastructure remotely, or on-site, for maximum reliability. It is a proactive service model which focuses on preventing problems before they occur to increase productivity and reduce operating expenses.  

Are Managed IT Services Right for My Business?

Ah, the million dollar question!  And the answer is…..It Depends.  Numerous factors come into play such as the size of your business, budget, expenses, how critical technology is to your business, and the level of risk you are willing to accept. With that being said it generally makes sense for companies with 10 or more PC’s and a server to take a hard look at Managed IT Services.     

Many business owners are hesitant about moving from a “pay as you go” plan to monthly subscription fee as paying a few hundred dollars to fix a PC problem here and there, can seem easier to swallow than being locked into a monthly “all you can eat” plan for thousands of dollars per month.  

 What are the Benefits of Managed Services?

•  You’ll eliminate expensive repairs and recovery costs. Network monitoring and maintenance will save you money by preventing expensive network disasters from ever happening in the first place.

• You’ll avoid expensive trip fees while receiving faster support. Remote monitoring software enables IT firms to access and repair most network problems right from their offices. No more waiting around for an engineer to show up!

• Faster performance, fewer “glitches”, and practically zero downtime. Some parts of your systems will degrade in performance over time, causing them to slow down, hang up, and crash. Preventative maintenance and network monitoring will make sure your computers stay in tip-top shape for maximum speed, performance, and reliability.
  
  
• ALL of the benefits of an in-house IT department WITHOUT all of the costs. With most IT firms you will have access to a knowledgeable support staff that can be reached immediately should you have any kind of problem or question.
  
  
• You’ll receive substantial discounts on IT services that you are already buying. Most IT firms will nickel and dime you over every little thing they do.  With Managed Services you pay one flat, affordable rate and get all of the technical support you need. No hidden charges, caveats, or disclaimers.

• You will never have to fear a big, expensive network repair bill. Instead, you can budget for network support just like rent or insurance.

• You’ll sleep easier knowing the “gremlins at the gate” are being watched and kept out of your network.

• You’ll safeguard your data. The data on the hard disk is always more important than the hardware that houses it. If you rely on your computer systems for daily operations, it’s time to get serious about protecting your critical, irreplaceable electronic information.
  
• You’ll finally put a stop to annoying spam, pop-ups, and spyware taking over your computer and your network.

• You’ll gain incredible peace of mind. As a business owner, you already have enough to worry about. We’ll make sure everything pertaining to your network security and reliability is handled so you don’t have to worry about it.

Making the switch from the traditional “Break-Fix” model of support to “Managed IT Services” can be confusing for many business owners.  If you should have questions about the types of support available and which one makes the most sense for your business feel free to reach out to me anytime at stephen@jngstech.com.

Posted under Save Money

I have fielded many questions in the past few months by clients, prospects, and the business community in general about cutting costs in their business, specifically IT costs. As a business owner myself I fully understand this.  The one thing we must keep in mind is being careful not to cut muscle while in the process of trimming the fat. So how do we know what is fat versus muscle? 

The key is “The Line”  (thank you Kent Erickson! http://www.pointivity.com)

Draw a line on a piece of paper.  Now think of all of the systems, applications, etc you use in your business.  If it is strategic to your business write it above the line.  If not, put the item below the line. 

Once you identify what is below the line do everything you can to drive down costs and focus on efficiencies (within reason and without hurting your business!)  Typically items in this category include things such as IT support, hardware costs, routers, switches, etc.  While these items are essential to your business they are not strategic (more to come on this topic in a future post).

Once you identify the items that are above the line you know what is strategic to your business.  Continue to invest, improve, and expand on these items as they help fuel growth, value, and competitive advantage.  Items such as Digital Marketing, CRM Systems, Line of Business Applications, and Data Mining fall into this category. 

The final step is to reallocate funds that may be budgeted for items that are not strategic to your business.  By taking these funds and investing them into Digital Marketing, for instance, you should see a far greater return than if you had invested them elsewhere.  For more information feel free to post a comment or email me at stephen@jngstech.com. 

Posted under Save Money

In the fourth and final entry into the saving money via technology series, we will take a look at using virtualization to cut down on your IT spending.

First, let us define virtualization.  Virtualization is the creation of a virtual — rather than an actual — version of something.  This can include things like operating systems or harddrives.  For example, we are running a Mac, but we need to use a program that only runs on Windows.  With virtualization software we could virtually start a copy of Windows and use the program we needed.  Essentially, there are two unique “computers” running on the same machine.

Although it’s great to have the ability to use multiple operating systems on the same computer, how does that save businesses money?  Let’s first take a look at where virtualization is in wide use today, servers.  Servers are expensive, power-hungry machines that provide the backbone of most companies’ IT.  Even a small company can have an email server, a SQL server, a file server, and a firewall.  If instead of having those four separate servers we virtualized them onto one, we have already saved money on the hardware costs.  And since we are only running a single server, we are also saving money monthly through decreased energy costs.  Also, if there were ever a need for an additional server, a virtualized server can just be added to the current host server.  Administration of a virtualized server is a lot easier as well.  Basic tasks like restoring can be accomplished faster than on an actual physical server.

Another area of virtualization that has been building up momentum over the past few years is desktop virtualization.  Essentially, desktops are replaced by “smart clients” that connect to a server that does all the work.  When someone is working within’ Microsoft Word on a smart client, the only thing the smart client is doing is providing a way to manipulate the data and display it.  These smart clients save businesses money by first being cheap to install and then having a long product life.  When combined with more inexpensive administrative costs, a “virtualized office” is starting to make cost-saving sense to a lot of companies.

Jennings Technologies is rolling out a new virtualization product soon, please use our contact us form to find out more information.

Posted under Save Money

In an ongoing four-part series, I investigate ways to save money using technology.  This week I will go over the process of streamlining business processes using technology to increase efficiency and keep costs down.

We often take technology for granted.  For example, email is a huge time saver.  If you were to consider the amount of time it would take either to call or visit each person you email in a day, you can start to appreciate how technology has made your life easier and more efficient.  Instead of having to catch up with an associate when they are available or when you have time, the email can be composed and responded to at any time.  Combine that with the super low cost - often free - of email, and you can see a technology that is already saving your company money.

Especially in “economic downturns” like we’re experiencing now, it is important for companies to immediately address their inefficiencies.  Sure, you may currently be using email, productivity suites like Microsoft Office, and Quickbooks to handle your accounting, but are you really leveraging technology to squeeze the most out of our business?  For example, does your business have large quanitites of paperwork?  Are people filling forms out by hand ?  A solution can be found or built that will take that information and catalog it so it can be efficiently input and retrieved at any time.  Hospitals, for instance, have saved a great amount of time, space, and resources by simply taking x-rays and moving them into a digital medium.

Bottom line, time is money.  The sooner you can streamline your processes, the sooner you can begin to save.   And with technology, the savings continue year after year.

If your ready to start saving with technology, please feel free to contact Jennings Technologies.  We have experience helping companies streamline process using both prebuilt and custom applications.

Posted under Save Money

While we have already covered the green benefits of digital marketing on this blog, it is also easier on your company’s bank account as well. In this blog, I will go over how digital marketing can save you money and offers additional benefits over traditional marketing.

So just how does Digital Marketing save you money? First, it takes away some of the costs that occur getting your message to your customer. Think of the cost of doing a direct mailer to your customer vs. an email. A direct mailer has both printing and shipping costs while an email is free. This makes the Digital Marketing scalable as well. If you decide to go larger with your campaign, you do not have to worry about getting more mailers printed up or budgeting for them; it’s the same cost for 1 as it is for 10,000.

There is also the efficiency of Digital Marketing. Whereas a storefront and sales force usually only work during business hours, about sixty hours a week, a digital campaign can be working twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. A potential customer can go on your website any day or night and request additional information from your company. If you sell products online, you could even be making sales while you sleep, the traffic being driven to your site by a well-crafted online campaign.

With online advertising methods such as pay per click and digital banners, you really can control the audience you want to reach. You can target people searching for certain keywords in certain parts of the country during a specific timeframe during the day. This comes in really handy if you are trying to reach a niche market. But if you are going for a larger market and want to take your campaign nationwide, it’s the same cost to market to someone in Boston as it is Los Angeles.

Most importantly, Digital Marketing allows for every aspect of your digital campaign to be measured. You can track how many people click on your links in an email blast or what pay-per-click ads are converting into sales on your site. Your potential customer is tracked from first impression all the way until the sale or contact is made. And since digital media is easily altered, you can make changes based upon the collected metrics until your message and sales flow are perfected. Instead of having to get a brochure reprinted, you are simply rewriting some content in a digital document. Finally, when it’s time to justify the cost of your digital marketing campaign, you have a definite ROI based upon those solid metrics.

For more information on our Kinetic Digital Marketing and what it can do for your business, please feel free to check out http://www.jenningstechnologies.com/digitalmarketing.asp.

Posted under Save Money

There are two schools of thought when it comes to pricing projects regardless of the industry that you are in.  Time and Materials based pricing and Flat Fee pricing.  Jennings Technologies is a huge proponent of the Flat Fee structure so when I came across this information in an article by Alan Weiss yesterday I felt I had to share it.

Benefits of Flat Fee Project Pricing

1. There is a cap on your investment. You know exactly what is to be spent and there are no surprises.
2. There is never a “meter running.” You do not have to worry each time our help is requested that we might be here for an hour, a day, or a week.
3. It is unfair to place you in the position of making an investment decision every time you may need our help. Otherwise, you’re trying to determine the impossible: Is this an issue that justifies a $2,000 visit or a $500 phone call. No client should ever be in that position.
4. Your people should feel free to use our assistance and to ask for our help without feeling they have to go to someone for budgetary approval. This only makes them more resistant to sharing their views, and at best delays the flow of important information.
5. If we find additional work that was unanticipated but must be performed, we can do it without having to come to you for additional funds. In those instances, legitimate, additional work would otherwise be viewed as self aggrandizing and an attempt to generate additional hours or days.
6. If you find additional, related work that must be done, you can freely request it without worrying about increased costs.
7. The overall, set fee, in relation to the project outcomes to be delivered, is inevitably less of a proportional investment than hourly billing.
8. If conditions change in your organization, you won’t be in the difficult situation of having to request that the project be completed in less time. The quality approach is assured, since the fee is set and paid.
9. If we decide that additional resources are necessary, there is no cost to you and we can employ additional help as we see fit.
10. This is the most uncomplicated way to work together. There will never be a debate about what is billable time (e.g., travel, report writing) or what should be done on‐site or off‐site.

Posted under Save Money

For every business, saving money should always be a priority. While it may be thrilling to watch revenue rise, there is usually large amounts of untapped money already in your business; it is just locked in inefficient processes and outdated systems.

Information technology presents many options to easily and consistently save you money month after month. Over the next few weeks, I will be detailing four ways that directly impact your business’s bottom line by keeping costs down. These are:

1. Switching over from traditional marketing tactics to digital – The web can give your businesses an opportunity to market your goods and services to a world-wide audience for a fraction of what traditional marketing costs.
2. Streamlining current business processes - With so many tools available, you can take some of the more time-consuming procedures in your business and turn them into efficient practices.
3. Managed Services – Why waste time maintaining your own IT infrastructure? For just a small portion of the cost of having an internal IT staff, you can have an external company manage your network, keeping it efficient and trouble free.
4. External hosting and virtualization – Technology and hardware are in a constant state of change. Why not let an outside company worry about keeping up with updates and security while you work on running your business?

Posted under Save Money