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By resolving one problem with break-fix tech support, you?re creating another more serious issue that could complicate your IT expenditures for the entire upcoming year. What if a seemingly-harmless issue turns out to be a serious problem that requires hours of maintenance to resolve? That?s all cash that you could have spent on implementing more effective solutions or replacing malfunctioning hardware that you?ll never see again. Contrary to popular belief, spending more money than necessary on IT problems only complicates your budget and makes it less flexible. So, what can you do to prevent this? There are two things you can do: either hire a full internal IT department who?s responsible for overseeing your entire technology infrastructure, or outsource the responsibility to a managed IT service provider. Chances are that a small or medium-sized business like yours doesn?t have the resources and budget immediately available to hire multiple trained IT professionals. You?re not alone in this; in fact, most SMBs experience a similar problem. Therefore, the best solution available for the SMB just so happens to be a fantastic one: outsourced IT. There are a plethora of benefits that come from letting an external party handle the administration of all your technology, including: Cost Savings: The main difference between break-fix IT and managed IT is the potential cost. With break-fix IT, you pay an hourly rate to fix already-broken technology. While this is swell, wouldn?t it be better if the technology didn?t break in the first place? This is the proactive stance that managed IT takes, and it comes at a fixed monthly rate that?s designed to turn your IT support into an operational expense, rather than a capital one. Tried-and-True Support: One of the main hold-ups that SMBs have when acquiring IT support is the cost of hiring trained professionals. Managed IT service providers like White Mountain IT Services have several skilled technicians who are dedicated to providing only the best service for your business?s technology. Unified Point of Contact: Instead of having a specific vendor for your printers trying to interface with the guy who set up your network, using White Mountain IT Services as your single ?throat to choke? means we have a full understanding of the nuances of your network, and can manage your many hardware and software vendors accordingly. The benefits don?t stop there. Managed IT provides a whole slew of potential benefits that can keep your business running at maximum capacity at all times. Just give us a call at (603) 889-0800 and ask about what makes us different from other technology professionals.
Have you ever tried describing a PC issue on the phone to tech support, and you get nowhere because you?re having such a difficult time describing the problem? To be sure, this is a frustrating experience. By taking a screenshot, you can send an image of the exact problem you?re experiencing, which will really help clear things up. Taking a screenshot is as easy as using the right keystrokes. Here?s how you do it. Taking a Screenshot in WindowsOn your Windows PC, you will notice a row of keys on your keyboard that you probably don?t use very much. It?s the very top row that includes all of the F1-F12 keys. To find the screenshot button, look to the right of F12 and locate the PrtScn key. By hitting this button, a .png file will be created of your entire desktop, but you?re not going to see it right away because the image is stored on your clipboard. To retrieve the image, you will next have to open an application that allows you to paste images from your clipboard. Popular programs like Microsoft Word, OneNote, or Outlook will do the trick. Even a common program like MS Paint will work. Once your application is opened, simply hold down CTRL and press V to paste your image. Let?s assume you used Microsoft Paint. With your screenshot now before you, you can use the application?s various image editing tools to manipulate the image. You can crop it to focus the attention on just the problem you?re experiencing, and you can overlay the image with text and arrows to clarify your issue. Finally, you will want to save your screenshot as an image so that you can share it. To do this, go to File > Save As. From here, you can give the file a name. With your image saved, you will now be able to access it from where you saved it and attach it to an email or instant message. You can skip that last step by pasting directly into your email with Microsoft Outlook. This is how you will send the image to your support team so they?ll know exactly what it is you?re experiencing. Using LightShot to Take ScreenshotsAs you can see, taking a screenshot isn?t terribly difficult. However, going the route we just showed you does create more steps than what?s necessary. The easiest way to take a screenshot is by using an app designed just for this purpose. One of the best (and free) apps, that we?ve found for taking screenshots is LightShot. You can download the app here: https://app.prntscr.com/en/download.html. With Lightshot installed on your PC, it will make it so that hitting the PrtScn key will grey out your entire screen. Next, use your cursor to select the area of your screen that you want to take a screenshot of. After you?ve done this, LightShot will give you the option to save your selection as an image, upload the selection to the cloud for easy access, and more. Once you get used to taking screenshots, you will find it to be an extremely handy tool that will revolutionize how you save and share images. As a bonus, you will find it much easier to communicate PC problems with your IT department. For IT support issues, […]
Cloud OptionsThere are three major cloud computing platforms that every small and medium-sized business owner should know. They are Platform as a Service (PaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS). Each of these offerings can be deployed from a public or private cloud system. Platform as a Service – PaaS provides organizations with a platform that provides users all the computing they need to develop, run, and manage web-based applications. This interface allows for high-level customization, without the complexity inherent in traditional development platforms. In other words, this is an extremely custom solution developed specifically for your unique needs. Infrastructure as a Service – IaaS provides users with a fully virtualized computing infrastructure platform. This interface allows users to do anything they would regularly do on their traditional computers. It can be hosted as an outsourced solution, or on a partitioned on-site server. Software as a Service – SaaS is basically the delivery of a piece of software that?s hosted in the cloud. By implementing a software as a service plan, users get the same software that they would have had to purchase and manage, in the cloud for a flat monthly fee. This allows business to shift costs from the capital budget to the operations budget, on a month-to-month basis. Microsoft?s Office 365 is a popular example of this. Cloud SecurityWhile it took some time for cloud computing to convince business professionals that it is a secure enough platform to ?do? business over, cloud implementation, specifically SaaS offerings, have seen an impressive increase over the past three years. This growth is due in large part to the revelation that a cloud interface is as secure as any other server as long as they are managed and maintained properly. A solution hosted in a data center that?s three states away is equally secure as the cloud environment hosted in your server room as long as they use the same security protocols; in fact, they can often afford better security than your budget may allow. For this reason the cloud?s upward trend figures to continue. By relying on secure and scalable cloud platforms, businesses can find affordable computing resources from dozens of reputable vendors that are no less secure than if you hosted them yourself. If you are one of the many business owners who feel as if they absolutely need control of their organization?s data, relying on a cloud platform that?s hosted outside of your place of business may be a difficult change to make. If you believe that controlling security permissions in-house and deploying it to the people that absolutely need it is the only way to keep your organization safe from security issues, then it may be time to reconsider that position by considering the benefits that integrating a cloud solution can deliver. At White Mountain IT Services, we can build a secure and powerful cloud platform that meets the needs of your business, and we can set you up with any cloud resource you may need to keep your IT costs low without losing the essential computing systems your business depends on. Call us today at (603) 889-0800 to speak with one of our trusted technology professionals.
Why is this? We live in a world that is more connected than any other previous generation. The Internet allows us to view information about a particular company in the blink of an eye, meaning that, if something good happens, we can know about it instantaneously. Unfortunately, this also holds true for when bad things happen. If a customer has a bad time dealing with your company, you can be sure that the Internet will find out about it; and in turn, so will the rest of the world. Customers Shape Your BusinessYour company is at the mercy of its clients. With a single bad review, your potential revenue can plummet. However, at the same time, a good review can make others that much more confident in your abilities. According to Vision Critical, it takes somewhere between 10-to-12 positive reviews to make up for one negative review. What?s worse is that 80 percent of people won?t buy products or services from a business with negative reviews. If there?s anything that can cause the death of a company, it?s a lack of customers and a lack of business. Other statistics concerning unhappy customers include: Customers are three times more likely to tell their friends about negative experiences, be it on social media or through word of mouth. Businesses with an average of three stars or more on Google Places get 87 percent of all clickthroughs. Restaurants in the Seattle area reported 5-to-9 percent increases in revenue gained following positive reviews on Yelp. That?s a Lot of Lost CashNow, here?s the really scary part of this whole situation: if you can?t make your customers happy, they will find someone who can. The lost profits are staggering. Here are some rough estimates concerning how much money an unhappy customer can actually cost your business: In the U.S. consumer market alone, there?s around $1,300,000,000,000 on the line. Yes, you read that right: trillion, with a capital ?T,? and thirteen figures. 51 percent of customers will switch businesses or service providers due to poor customer experience. 81 percent of customers who switch businesses claim that the company could have prevented them from leaving. Totaled together, that?s approximately $537,030,000,000 lost by unhappy customers every year. What?s more, customers who are completely satisfied will always contribute more cash (up to 14 times more) toward a goal than those who are even somewhat dissatisfied. Remember, it costs 6-to-7 times more cash to gain new customers than to retain an existing one. Logically, the best way to do business is to satisfy your current clients before taking on new ones. Therefore, one of the most dynamic ways to increase your bottom line may be to simply keep everyone happy. As you know, this is a task that?s easier said than done, but obviously, it?s worth the extra effort. What are some ways your business likes to engage customers to increase satisfaction? Let us know in the comments?
Depending on your situation, you might have an internal IT department that focuses on daily operations, or one that focuses solely on innovation, leaving your users to handle the various daily maintenance and upgrades your network needs. While this is better than no IT department at all, you run the risk of user error that could potentially leave your infrastructure unguarded; or worse, breached and compromised by hackers. This is the primary reason you want your IT department to be in complete and total contact with the rest of your business?s departments. It smooths operations and makes troubleshooting issues much easier than if you?re relying on those who aren?t trained professionals. Plus, ensuring that your IT department is in contact with the rest of your team allows for them to communicate network troubles, server issues, email complications, and more. This helps to make sure that everyone is on the same page, and thus, understands that situations are under control and being addressed. For example, one of your users isn?t skilled at working with technology. They might experience simple issues, like being unable to access the network or having difficulty working within your chosen email solution. Instead of bothering your internal IT department, which should be primarily focused on implementing new time-saving solutions, they can contact White Mountain IT Services?s Help Desk. When you work with White Mountain IT Services?s experienced, helpful IT staff, you get the quality of work you expect from an internal IT department at a fraction of the cost. Not only are our technicians more than capable of solving average, day-to-day issues, they?re also skillful and knowledgeable enough to diagnose and treat more serious problems with your IT infrastructure. It?s our mission to know and understand the nuances of your network so a user can?t catch us off guard. At the end of the day, White Mountain IT Services wants to be your go-to source for any and all technology-related issues your business might encounter. We work with you to establish clear, concise expectations, so you can always know what services you?re getting, and at what cost. There are no secret fees or hidden add-on costs. For more information on how we can help your business succeed, give White Mountain IT Services a call at (603) 889-0800.
