Computers are more than ever essential for business. We rely on them not just for day to day operations such as sales and warehousing, for word processing and spreadsheets, but increasingly the technology runs our telephone systems and more. Of course the more you rely on technology, the more you need it to run smoothly and that means having a support team that can address problems in a timely manner.
It’s always good to have IT support people who are familiar with your systems and the needs of your business. But setting up a help desk and support team in-house can be expensive in terms of both money and resources. For small and medium businesses this can be a particular burden.
Outsourcing, on the other hand, gives you access to staff who are trained in handling a wide range of IT issues. This means that your business is able to concentrate on its core operations rather than having to worry about technical problems. That’s not the only benefit to outsourcing however, let’s take a look at some others.
Budget Control
With businesses under constant pressure to control spending and cut costs, having a consistent budget allocated to IT support is a notable advantage. With outsourcing, you will have a regular monthly payment to deal with. In-house teams, in contrast, will incur additional costs in areas such as training, recruitment costs, buying equipment to replace failures and more. All these additional expenses can make it harder to keep track of the budget and can be a particular burden on smaller businesses. With outsourced support, payments will only usually need to change when your business needs do.
Concentrating on your business
Most people didn’t go into business to become IT experts. But IT is essential to most modern businesses. By outsourcing your IT support, you can devote more resources to making your core business profitable and successful. For smaller businesses in particular, time spent grappling with IT issues is time that’s not being spent on other aspects of the business.
An experienced IT company will be used to dealing with a wide variety of IT issues and will have expertise in both general and specialist areas. This means that they will be able to isolate issues more quickly and get your users back up and running faster than if you had to handle things in house.
Improved Security
Security breaches and data loss are a fact of modern life and can cause serious damage to a business in terms of both reputation and financial cost. [1] But keeping your systems secure can be complex. One small error, in network configuration for example, can leave you open to attack.
An outsourced IT supplier will have far greater experience in dealing with security issues. They will also have access to the latest security technology and will devote time to keeping up to date with the most current threats, so they can respond effectively to keep your business protected.
Business Continuity
We all hope that problems such as floods, fires, or burglaries won’t happen to our business. But we do need to plan a response, should they occur. Getting your computer systems up and running again after a disaster is always a high priority.
This means having effective backups, in the cloud or on external media, and being able to restore them effectively so you get back up and running fast. Again, an outsourced IT supplier will have the experience and resources to be able to do this quickly and will also be able to help you to source replacement equipment if needed.
[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/cyber-security-breaches-survey-2019