5 Small Business Technology Tips

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A small business without a technology expert on their team is a recipe for disaster because most of the time, the company’s owners don’t know what kind of technology to buy and certainly don’t know how t use it. This causes mass confusion and frustration in the office. On the other hand, when a business has a technology “expert” who recommend the latest and greatest, companies can end up spending money they don’t necessarily need to spend. In this post, I will guide you through 5 small business technology tips that I have developed after more than 20 years as a small business technology consultant.

Don’t Spend Too Much

One of the biggest mistakes a company can make is spending a lot of money on new equipment when they really don’t need all of it.The most important thing for a company to do is make a list of what they need (i.e. computers, printers, software) and then list the features that are completely necessary to have (not features that you want). This can be anywhere from “I need a lot of memory so I can run this advanced program” to “I need a good graphics card so I can run my CAD software effectively“. See that difference between need and want?

When you’re first starting out, it is crucial that you don’t spend too much money on complicated systems or computers that you don’t need.

Buy Quality Products

This tip goes hand in hand with the tip above. Although I recommend that you don’t spend much, you still need to make sure that you are spending your money on equipment that is going to work a year from now. With all of my clients, I recommend Dell computers. Now I do understand that people are very loyal to certain brand and I might have just annoyed some of you by recommending one brand over another. But, the only reason why I chose Dell is because they make quality business-grade products that I can be sure my clients will love.

The key is finding a brand, or a collection of brands, that you trust. Once you find your brand, look for discounted products on sites like eBay or Craigslist.

Backup Everything!

The worst situation for any business to be in is finding that one of your computers crashed and you lost everything. Picture this: accounting date, gone. Customer data, gone. Major proposals, gone. Vital emails, gone.

Once you think about how much of your life, and your business, is on your computer, you’ll realize the importance of backing everything up. The piece of software that I recommend to my clients for this is Mozy Pro. Now, you can find other services that do the same thing or you can even hook up an external hard drive to your computer. But, whatever you do, make sure to be backing up your computer nightly.

Get Help

As your business grows, so does your technology needs. And as your technology needs grow, you can no longer really on that one employee who know a thing or two about computers. Even though he helped you set up the company Wi-Fi, he probably can’t set up the company server. For this, I recommend that you either hire an in-house technology specialist, or hire a consultant. The advantage to a consultant over an in-house guy is that consultants only bill you when they’re doing work while an in-house guy is another employee, so they’re there all day either doing work or not.

Embrace the Mobile Workplace

There is no doubt that it is getting easier and easier to work outside of the office. Between devices like the iPad and smartphones to software like LogMeIn or TeamViewer, it is easy to make your company mobile-compatible.

When it comes to which devices to chose, I recommend that you go with what is easier for you to use because almost all devices will support mobile workplace software.

In the way of the actual software, you should shop around to see what each has to offer. And remember, always try the free version of software before you buy it. Not only will it give you a tatse of what the full version is like, but it can also keep you from buying software that either has too many features or doesn’t have enough.