Client-server networks can help employees perform 20 percent more revenue-producing tasks. For small to medium businesses that may not be able to afford a dedicated IT staff, outsourcing may be the most cost-effective means of installing and maintaining such a network.

You’re probably aware of the benefits of a client-server network—but are you prepared to handle the maintenance? If not, you may want to consider Managed Services.

According to a Forbes study, client-server networks help small businesses extend their geographic reach, find new customers, and increase revenues while maintaining or decreasing costs—and as a result, employees at small businesses using client-server networks perform 20 percent more revenue-producing tasks.

However, installing and maintaining such a network isn’t easy. It requires you to stay on top of the latest technology, monitor backups, and troubleshoot problems.

The traditional method of installing and maintaining a client-server network is to hire a staff of IT professionals to do the work, but this may not be realistic for small or even mid-sized businesses not be able to afford a dedicated IT staff.

Outsourcing may be a cost-effective way to solve this problem. If you want to outsource, you could hire an IT company to set up your client-server network, then wait for the network to break down before calling the IT company to perform the repair.

Or, you could consider Managed Services. With Managed Services, an IT company monitors your network to ensure performance and troubleshoot problems before they get out of hand. And in the unlikely event that something goes wrong, you’ll have qualified professionals on call to come to the rescue. Moreover, your support costs should be approximately the same as if you were paying for reactive support—but your network’s performance and reliability will be significantly higher.

So why spend time and money running a network when both can be better spent running your business? Consider Managed Services for you client-server network maintenance.

Industry analyst IDC predicts that the global economic recession will have a dramatic impact on small and mid-sized companies. But that doesn’t means these companies will stop spending on information technology (IT).

“Small and mid-sized businesses…will be increasingly interested in the productivity gains made possible by advanced technology,” said Raymond Boggs, vice president of SMB research at IDC. “New mobile communications solutions, videoconferencing, and online resources will be especially attractive, as will alternative approaches to technology acquisition and deployment.”

The reason, says IDC, is that these advanced technologies can help reduce costs and provide growing businesses with an important competitive edge.

One way to gain access to these advanced IT technologies is through Managed Services, which offers smaller companies access to and quick deployment of affordable best-of-breed technologies. Managed Services is cost-effective because it offers companies a way to make use of precious capital by fulfilling their IT needs on a pay-per-use basis.

Who can benefit from Managed Services?

• Smaller companies that don’t employ dedicated IT staff but want to take advantage of the latest developments in security, backups, messaging, and business communications.

• Mid-size companies with some in-house IT staff that want to see productivity gains among by eliminating problems and downtime.

Contact us for more information about how our Managed Services can increase your productivity while saving your money.

If you’re like most small or medium-sized businesses, you’ve become increasingly dependent on IT—and you want your IT to provide the functionality and security that large enterprises enjoy.

But cost is an issue. The expense required to design, deploy, and maintain such an environment is often too great for small and medium-sized organizations.

Today, however, you don’t have to choose between the best IT and the most cost-effective option—because with Managed Services, they’re often the same.

Managed Services is an IT model that provides IT management and security remotely. Using the latest technology, we proactively monitor and manage your network, identity potential problems, and fix them before they put your business in a standstill.

The benefits are twofold:

• Better IT: With Managed Services, you can gain the functionality and security that was previously only available to large organizations.

• Lower cost: And, you can do it cost effectively. Due to economies of scale, Managed Services allows you to build an infrastructure that provides critical IT services to employees and customers without creating or supporting these services internally.

Talk to us today to find out how our Managed Services can help improve your IT and save you money.

In today’s tough market environment, many small and medium businesses are turning to Managed Services. But is the up-front cost worth it? We say yes—and think you’ll agree when we explain why.

With Managed Services, an IT consultant constantly manages your network, typically from afar. In other words, someone will prevent many IT problems—and fix those that do occur before they disrupt your operations.

Despite this benefit, many companies still consider Managed Services an unnecessary expense because it typically involves a monthly or yearly fee. But there are many ways that such a model can actually lower your IT costs.

• Lower overhead. It can be expensive to hire and train IT staff. In fact, staffing is often the largest portion of a company’s IT budget. You can eliminate much of that expense with Managed Services, which provide you with high-quality IT staff at a fraction of the cost.

• Increased cost predictability. The cost of responding to an IT problem is usually an unplanned expense—and often a significant one. With Managed Services, you prevent problems, so you can better predict (and therefore manage) IT costs.

• A better business model. Additionally, Managed Services provide an efficient business model. There’s less IT down time, which means employees are less frustrated and customers are always served. That increases employee retention and helps you create long-term business relationships—which in turn can increase your revenue.

Contact us today for more information about our Managed Services.

Most small and medium businesses can’t afford the luxury of a qualified IT administrator, let alone an entire IT department. If you’re in this position, how do you maintain the information technology infrastructure that’s critical to your organization?

One option is Managed Services, in which you outsource this role to an IT expert called a “managed services provider,” which will typically offer on-site or remote network and security monitoring, data backup and technical support.

Because the Managed Services model allow a business to focus on its core competencies, it is increasing in popularity—but sometimes it’s hard to separate the real benefit from the hype.

What’s the value to you?

• Peace of mind. Your managed services provider will monitor your IT infrastructure and prevent or resolve any problems—a sharp diversion from the traditional “fix it when it breaks” model of IT management.

• Simplicity. Your managed services provider will provide many of its services remotely, via the Internet, instead of through on-site visits. This reduces time and cost.

• Constant support. You don’t have to worry about support; your  managed services provider will offer the assistance you need, when you need it.

• Affordability. Managed services providers typically offer several price structures, including a per-month fee—which is much lower than the cost of building an in-house IT support department.

• Accountability. Have you ever tried to resolve an IT problem only to find that one vendor blames it on another who blames it on another? With managed services, you don’t have to go to multiple vendors to figure out why your network is down or you’ve experienced a security breach. You’ll have one point of contact: your managed services provider.

Want to learn more about how Managed Services can give you dependable IT with predictable costs? Give us a call.

You expect your computer to work when you turn it on. The last thing you want is to waste valuable time trying to get your email running or wrestling with a web browser that won’t load.

These are frustrations you surely have experienced, and chances are you will again. But you don’t have to. Or, at the very least, you can make them as rare as your refrigerator breaking down or your car battery dying.

To get there, you need to understand how well your IT environment is running. No, we’re not suggesting that you look under the hood to figure out what does what and how. Leave that to the IT people. What we’re proposing is a comprehensive endeavor to document all your IT processes and inventory your IT assets. Identify your best practices – those processes and functions that experience has proven to run efficiently and produce the most desirable results – and document them as part of your overall business practices.

During the process of documenting your IT processes and functions, you’re bound to discover your IT environment isn’t as efficient as it should be – hence, your computer-borne frustrations. You’ll also identify needs that you weren’t aware of. Left unaddressed, these needs cut into productivity (and therefore profits), and can sometimes lead to costly IT network emergencies that would have been a lot less expensive with the right technology and proper maintenance in place.

Let us help assess your needs through this documentation process, and identify solutions that will bring you peace of mind. Some common solutions include outsourcing some of your network functions such as security, backup and recovery, or email, so that they are maintained and updated to keep them running smoothly and prevent costly downtime.

You expect your computer to work when you turn it on – and that is what we want to make sure happens.