There is no question that a small business can benefit from technology, as has been proven time and time again. However, an issue can arise if a business bites off more than it can chew, so to speak, and ultimately creates a spike in costs. A responsible business owner will resist this temptation and prioritize the solutions they need over the ones they want – building profitability and generating capital needed to make other improvements. In this blog, we’ll examine some of the implementations that can deliver a good return on investment to a small business.
Profitability is less the measure of being able to turn a profit, and more the measure of how much profit you can make. For the successful small business, the integration of technology can dictate what kind of annual margins you are looking at. For the new company, however, it can be something even more critical: the difference between setting a course for success, or wallowing in failure. Today we analyze the cost difference between hosting your IT in-house, or choosing to host it in the cloud.
The cloud has proven to be an extremely useful tool for the modern business. Not only does it provide anywhere-anytime access to applications, processing, storage, et al; it also delivers those products as a service, allowing you to budget for recurring costs rather than major upfront ones. This provides your organization with functional, supported, and secure computing environments that eliminate a lot of the support costs that traditional computing environments require. It sounds like a perfect scenario for small and large businesses alike, but things aren’t always what they seem, as a lot of cloud users have found that they have incurred several hidden costs by using cloud platforms. Today, we take a look at these hidden costs.
How much does your business rely on technology to keep your organization running forward? As business technology becomes more complex, it’s becoming increasingly popular for organizations to have their own internal IT departments to manage and maintain it. Yet, small businesses don’t often have the necessary funds for such a feat. How can your company afford quality IT service? You can start by pursuing managed IT solutions from a managed service provider.
Don’t Share Confidential Information Don’t provide sensitive company or customer information in unsolicited emails or phone calls. It’s important to remember that the bad guys can be very convincing and what they do tricks a lot of users. Being on the lookout for anything suspicious will help protect confidential information. Emailing usernames and passwords is never a good idea. Be especially cautious of suspicious emails that look like they are from PayPal or a bank. Use Strong Passwords Don’t reuse the same password for multiple accounts. Passwords should contain capital and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols. Passwords should not contain personally identifiable information like social security numbers or dates of birth. Avoid Accessing Sensitive Information on Unprotected Computers Hotel business centers and Internet cafes typically aren’t regulated or secure. Accessing sensitive information on public devices could allow others to access it as well. Malicious software could allow others to snoop on what you are doing, and gather usernames, passwords, and credit card information. Ask your IT department about establishing a VPN to allow safe access while traveling. Avoid Leaving Sensitive Information Lying Around Don’t keep passwords on sticky notes. Shred documents that contain confidential information. Don’t leave mobile devices, laptops, or desktops unlocked when you aren’t at them. Use Windows key + L to quickly lock your computer when stepping away. Small devices like phones, portable hard drives, and flash drives are easy to lose or steal. Be wary of this while traveling. Report Anything Suspicious to IT If we know about it, we can fix it quickly before it becomes a bigger problem. If you’ve lost your smartphone or another device, report it immediately.
Experience and Qualification Don’t Always Go together consider the regular duties of an internal IT department. Unless the business in question is doing a few things very wrong, the IT department probably isn’t putting out major fires on a regular basis, either literally or figuratively. Furthermore, consider the possibility that, while your internal resource is experienced in a particular version of some process or solution, what about the new versions that they have yet to encounter? When the time comes to implement these later versions out of necessity, your internal IT resources will be unfamiliar with them, essentially starting at square one. On the other hand, an MSP is much more likely to have dealt with major issues more often than an internal resource may have. This is because they will have been monitoring the network systems of numerous clients in order to protect them, rather than monitoring a single organization’s resources. This means that they are statistically more likely to have to deal with new issues than a single internal team might. For similar reasons, they are much more likely to be educated in more up-to-date solutions, as their variety of clients are more likely to have different versions of a wider range of programs put into place. An MSP Allows Their Clients to Be More Competitive One of the most clear benefits of outsourcing is the fact that it frees your internal employees to accomplish other things that will advance your business. This doubled productivity can have a few effects on the SMB in question. First, outsourcing allows much of the same progress to be made on a project for comparable, if not lower, costs than it would take for an internal team to dedicate their time to the same project. As a result, the SMB can become more competitive by offering their clients a relief from these costs. Plus, by utilizing an MSP, an SMB can often take advantage of technology services that would otherwise only be available to large corporations. In doing so, that business can leverage the same tools to provide comparable services on a more personal level, encouraging their prospects to go to them first. Security, Risk Management, and Compliance are MSP Priorities A business could be very easily crippled if they experienced a data leak that allowed their customers’ data to fall into the wrong hands. In response to this, businesses are held to a variety of standards that they must be faithful to in order to accept digital forms of payment. An MSP’s services include ensuring that a business is fully secured and in compliance with these mandated requirements. Additionally, a managed service provider can help protect a business from internal risks as well. Through the monitoring of the business’ systems, an MSP can identify potential issues and resolve them before they negatively impact the business. These were just a few brief examples of how outsourcing some IT responsibilities to a managed service provider can benefit your business in the short and long term. For more information, reach out to us at (831) 758-3636 to talk about solutions for your Business.
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Use Proper Password ManagementAs one of the most important parts of protecting your infrastructure, password management can’t be ignored. Your passwords should be complex, using both upper and lower-case letters, numbers, and symbols. While this might make them difficult to remember, an enterprise-level password manager can make this task easier. Check for Security CertificatesBefore you enter sensitive credentials into any website, you should first check to see that it’s secured with a security certificate. In Google Chrome, you can check this by looking for the green padlock icon next to the URL in the address bar. In general, if you see a website with an https:// in the URL, it’s probably secure, but it’s still best to check the certificate. Implement a Spam FilterHackers tend to use email as a scamming option. They will include links that lead to malicious downloads or fake websites that are designed to harvest your credentials. You can dodge many of these bullets by hovering over the link and checking to see where it goes, before you actually download the file or go to the website. Be Careful of What You Download Online “freeware,” will often come bundled with unwanted programs, like adware or browser add-ons. Many of these add-ons can be malicious in nature, so it’s best to always pay attention to end-user license agreement prompts, and to be on the lookout for what you are agreeing to. In other words, don’t leave checkboxes checked unless you actually want what they’re offering. Always Keep a Firewall and Antivirus Solution ActiveIt’s of the utmost importance to always keep a firewall and antivirus running on your network and its endpoints. Firewalls can keep threats out of an infrastructure, while an antivirus can eliminate the threats that manage to make it through your defenses. Never disable your firewall for any reason. Use Content FilteringMost business owners associate content filtering with blocking social media and other time-wasting online content, but its use extends far beyond that. With content filtering, you can keep your users from accessing fake websites or those that contain malware that could negatively affect your infrastructure. Identify Phishing AttacksWhile a spam filter can keep some phishing emails at bay, others will undoubtedly still make it through the restrictions. Phishing attacks use deception to trick users into handing over important credentials or sensitive data. The hacker might even pretend to be someone else in order to extort information from you. Look for spelling errors or inconsistencies if you receive messages from unsolicited sources, and never let your guard down. You can even cross-check the email addresses or phone numbers that you have on file to check if the user is legit or trying to scam you. Just Use Common Sense People tend to act impulsively or irrationally when faced with threats like malware and viruses. Instead, you should devote your time and energy into resolving the problem, rather than panicking. Doing so can help minimize the damage done and avoid the threats altogether. For more great security tips and tricks, reach out to SRS Networks at (831) 758-3636, and subscribe to our blog.
Email is (and has been) a prime method of communication for businesses of all sizes. With email comes a whole slew of issues that are essentially synonymous with the technology; spam, information overload, phishing, and information privacy. Even California small businesses that only do business locally are at risk of these issues. Personal email accounts are equally at risk. Employing proper precautions and practices whenever communicating via email is very important to prevent the risk of security compromises, monetary loss, and even legality issues.
Your identity has quite a lot of value, especially in the wrong hands. Security firm ZoneAlarm put together some numbers in 2011 concerning identity fraud, and it even shocked us. Let’s talk about a few of these statistics and what it means.