Opening a new location can be difficult. When is the right time to expand? If you think you’ve reached that point, you will need to ascertain how to use technology throughout multiple locations. In this month’s newsletter, we’ll discuss some of the considerations you have to make in order to get the technology that will help you move into your new location and sustain the demands that it will put on that technology.
Technology and Your Business
Chances are you understand just how important your IT is to your business. You probably wouldn’t be in the position you are in without it. The challenge of understanding what technology you need when opening a new location is that it will probably be more than you currently use if you only have one location. Sure, there may be similar hardware, but you not only need more of it, you also need a way to get your systems running over multiple locations and centralize your data.
Let’s go through some of the technologies that you should be considering if you are looking to expand your business into multiple new locations.
Utilizing the Cloud
For businesses looking to move their operations over multiple locations, no other technology is going to be as useful as cloud computing. Not only can you centralize your central computing, you can get the software systems you need to run your business in the cloud. This includes your business communications (telephone, email, video conferencing); productivity (word processor, spreadsheet/database management, presentation tool); operations (customer relationship management, human resources software, payroll); and solutions that help drive your marketing and sales processes.
While the costs associated with cloud platforms can be higher than with the traditional method of technology deployment, you won’t be wasting resources and you can scale your solutions up and back as needed. This flexibility really brings any organization the value they seek, especially ones that need that flexibility as they grow rapidly.
Get the IT Support Needed to Keep Downtime Low
One of the major problems when businesses open new locations is that they outfit the technology that has worked in previous locations and expect it to work the same. Many times it will, but there are situations where as a business grows that it needs to have specialized support capabilities to help employees fix technical issues as they pop up. Nothing is more destabilizing to a new location than to have loyal customers provide negative feedback because the technology at the new location isn’t working properly.
At XFER, our managed IT services not only have the proactive maintenance and management capabilities that keep a business’ IT running reliably, but we also have options to support a business’ workforce should they run into technology troubles. Our help desk resource can get any worker reliable IT support around the clock from certified IT technicians. Also, should there be situations where the help desk can’t resolve an issue, XFER offers onsite support that will help you get your IT up and running fast.
It’s a satisfying feeling when you meet your goals and get to expand your business, but it can create many more headaches if things go wrong. If you would like to talk to one of our IT professionals about getting the IT experts at XFER to help you set up your future business plans, give us a call today at 734-927-6666 / 800-GET-XFER.
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