So, What's Your Plan?

Which plan is that? The one for how all your IT applications work together to help your business succeed. The plan that goes right along with your business plan as one of the important living documents that you read and update every year. The one that details what your business needs to accomplish your mission, whether it's building hotels or building brands through innovative marketing programs. That plan that identifies what IT resources you have, what they do, and how you know they are effective, current, and secure.

If you're mumbling something like, "I know, I'm going to do that one of these days, but I've been busy, and you know how it is." Yes, we do know. After the first rush of getting a business launched, you focus on making it grow. As you need new IT solutions, you buy the software that seems best for the particular task. Only later do you find out that there is no way to export data from one system to another. You upgrade the operating system and then learn that some of your important applications won't run anymore. It happens all the time, and small businesses pay the price in slowed growth and unnecessary cost.

Last week we talked about how small businesses can learn from how large corporations handle their systems. You don't have to have millions of clients and billions of dollars to get the best combination of IT resources; all you need is some solid planning before you start spending. That's what large organizations do; they invest in planning before they spend the first dollar.

A solid IT plan starts with defining all your needs and then identifying the best solutions to meet them. It includes planning for hardware, operating system, and software version upgrades including system security. An important part of planning that is sometimes overlooked is setting the policies that define how the system will be used, and when components will or will not be replaced.

Take for example if you have 10 staff and 5 PCs. Your plan should include a statement regarding how the internet will be controlled, and a policy preventing employees from downloading too much of the wrong thing. Not only could you have a security risk with all those downloads, but you might be blowing your budget on broadband costs, running up $1,000's of unnecessary cost. One method is to remove control of firewall software from the end user and buy a robust router. This centralises control and lets you manage the network. Or consider this: The average total cost of ownership for a PC out of warranty and more than 3 years old is around $600 per year, and even more with lesser known brands. But a new PC with a 3-year warranty is around $1,100. Do the math and you'll find a saving of more than 33% over a 3-year period. It pays to turnover your network hardware when the warranties run out.

Your plan documents all of this so you have a blueprint for growth, doesn't it?. Yes, you can probably do this yourself - if you have the expertise to compare the technical options and understand the complexities of putting together software from different vendors to create the unique package that will serve you best. Or, you can do what larger companies have learned is the easier and more cost-effective way; choose an experienced professional IT implementer to guide you through the maze of possibilities.

So, what's your plan?

At Chill we take the heat out of IT. No matter what pressure you are under, we will always keep our heads and make sure you get back up and running as soon as possible. So don't sweat - Chill IT. Click here for more information on our consulting services.

Bring Them Down To Size – Manage Small Business IT with Big Network Techniques

Have you ever felt that your IT systems were running you instead of the other way around? If you've lost data with failed backups, had your email system hold your emails hostage, been unable to get your system to generate invoices…then you know the risks of not managing your small business IT system.

Frustrating? Absolutely. Just the way it is? Absolutely not!

Savvy small business owners know that they can learn a lot from how large scale networks are managed. Large organisations implement systems that reduce downtime, protect data, and generate cost benefits. These companies don't have any secret solutions – they just plan for and actually make changes that keep their IT systems up to date and running smoothly.

Your small business can also benefit from a plan that:

• Identifies and implements the best applications for your needs;
• Controls changes to your network and tracks the related costs;
• Completely documents the IT processes and procedures;
• Tracks your IT assets and manages the financing for your benefit; and
• Includes a well designed disaster recovery and business continuity plan.

Any one of these large scale network management techniques can help you get control of your IT system. Implement a full range, and you will find cost savings and a large dose of peace of mind for your small business.
Now…wouldn't it be good if you found a company that could help you do all this, at a small business fee you can afford? You just have.

At Chill we take the heat out of IT. No matter what pressure you are under, we will always keep our heads and make sure you get back up and running as soon as possible. So don't sweat - Chill IT. Click here for more information on our consulting services.

Is Your Marketing Message Getting Through?

You know what it's like…you open your email in the morning and see dozens of unread emails, maybe more. Now put yourself in your client's place. After dealing with the urgent emails, which messages do you think will be opened and read?

The answer is, the emails that deliver a valuable message, in an easy-to-read and pleasing form, are the ones that will be read and remembered. The challenge for you as a business owner is making sure your message is one of them. Not only do you need a message that works, you need an email marketing system that creates professional-looking emails, helps you manage contact email lists, and measure results. Above all, you want confidence that your messages will be delivered, and you want to be able to collect information from your market.

Sound like a full time job? It can be, but there's another option for the small business owner. Let someone else do it! Instead of spending hours and dollars trying to do it yourself, consider one of the companies that is set up specifically to handle email marketing. Companies like Constant Contact and Vertical Response can help you manage this important part of your marketing program.

The advantage to your business is two-fold. First, these email marketing companies have systems that let you run campaigns, include surveys, and stay in touch with clients and prospects alike. Whether you send a regular newsletter or need a special promotion, they are pros at marketing and might even have some new ideas you can use. Second, and just as important, the time and money you save can be spent where they will do the most good in building your bottom line.

Email marketing is here to stay. If you're going to reach out to your market, doesn't it make sense to get the most for your investment?

At Chill we take the heat out of IT. No matter what pressure you are under, we will always keep our heads and make sure you get back up and running as soon as possible. So don't sweat - Chill IT. Click here for more information on our consulting services.

Backup or Break Up – Data Loss Could be Bad News For Your Business

I just saw a very disturbing statistic: 93% of companies that suffer a significant data loss are out of business within five years. That's from the U.S., but data loss doesn't care about national boundaries. Small to medium sized businesses are especially vulnerable if there is no in-house IT staff, which is often the case. Whether from a hardware failure, natural disaster, virus, or just plain human error, the risk of losing data is a business crisis waiting to happen for companies that do not manage the backup process well.

Though most businesses have some backup plan, there is often a gap between plan and reality. When backing up is not someone's primary responsibility, it's too easy to let that slide in favor of some other pressing task. But even when people have good solid backups they do not always take that extra step and test the backups. Have you ever tried to restore files from a damaged tape? Or perhaps from a tape that is taken offsite for safety (good idea) but not available when it's needed (bad idea.) And even backups to other media are only as reliable as the people and the media they depend on.

The thing is, there just is no excuse anymore for not backing up all your data regularly. With on line backup services you can delegate this important function to a company that thinks of nothing but securing, storing, and restoring your data. You can schedule online backups to run automatically to the provider's server, with no interruption to your business.

The data is secured by encryption both during the backup and while stored. And if you need to restore a file, it's generally available in minutes. What if you have staff scattered around the globe, each with a PC full of important data? There are systems for that, too, so that your data can be safeguarded wherever it happens to be. A PC with an Internet connection can also recover those files when needed. And, of course, your data is automatically stored offsite for added protection.

There is a variety of service levels for online backup, so even a small company with a limited budget can find a cost effective solution. Whatever the cost, it is sure to be a bargain compared to recreating lost data. It's some of the least expensive business insurance you can buy. Get started today!

At Chill we take the heat out of IT. No matter what pressure you are under, we will always keep our heads and make sure you get back up and running as soon as possible. So don't sweat - Chill IT. Click here for more information on our consulting services.

Where Did I Put That File?

Two weeks ago, a team member wrote a terrific report. You read it and then filed it, but did you put it in the client's folder on the G: drive, or in the solutions folder on the E: drive? Last month a colleague sent you an email about an innovative solution that she a read about in an online article. Since then you've received more than 80 emails a day; what are the chances you can find that one easily? And just this morning your best client called with a problem you know you could solve easily if you could only figure out what folder that report was in and where you filed that email.

Sound frustratingly familiar? The problem has never been filing information - it's always been finding it later when you need it. It used to be that storing information in shared folders required rigorous application of rules as to where everything went. But of course, the more people who added content to the folders, the more likely it became that something would not be filed where it "belonged." In the massive virtual filing cabinets we keep these days, data may be safe and secure but it's not always easy to locate.

Until now. Both Google Search Appliance and Microsoft SharePoint Server for Search offer a way to dip into your deep stores of data and come out with just what you're looking for, no matter where it may be hiding. Companies have been working on developing enterprise search tools for several years, and these two are good examples of the power of positive searching to get just the results you need, when you need them. These wonderful tools allow you to search for files in a whole host of areas, and the "hits" you get back are usually what you are looking. Best of all, it doesn't matter where they are!

One company had more than 300,000 documents in various repositories including wikis, blogs, websites, CRM systems, eRooms, PDFs, and MS Word documents. This company also had to balance access to information with maintaining the security of sensitive company information. By installing an enterprise search solution, and adding some customization, the company opened up a new world of information retrieval. Now, both their employees and offshore workers are able to do their jobs much more effectively.

The capabilities of these search tools to pull together useful, timely information are truly impressive. If you ever find yourself wondering, "Where did I put that…?" you should take a look at the new generation of search tools.

At Chill we take the heat out of IT. No matter what pressure you are under, we will always keep our heads and make sure you get back up and running as soon as possible. So don't sweat - Chill IT. Click here for more information on our consulting services.

The Handheld Revolution

There you are in a hotel two or three time zones from home, feet up and cool beverage in hand. You've finished your meetings for the day and now it's time to open the laptop, check on email, review your next presentation, and get ready for tomorrow. Except the hotel's Internet connection is down so your laptop isn't talking to anyone, at least for the time being. Not a problem. You have your hand-held, perhaps a BlackBerry or maybe a Treo, and you're still in business.

Mobile computing has improved exponentially in the last few years to the point that, today, you can make phone calls, receive and send emails and instant messages, take pictures, update your calendar, browse the Internet, download and review documents, and play music, all from that one small device. There are models that have WiFi capability, 3G technology, and video recording ability. With some, you can even figure out where you are with GPS capabilities.

With older handheld devices, when you were away from home base and your PDA's synching cradle, you had to depend on email or a phone call to let you know about a schedule change. No more. The newer handhelds have push technology that doesn't wait for you to ask "What's new?" Changes to your calendar, tasks, and email in Outlook take only seconds to automatically synch to your BlackBerry, Windows Mobile or mobile phone calendar.

Sometimes what you need is a quick look at a document or spreadsheet. No problem now for the newer handhelds. With small screen readers much better than they used to be, you can receive Acrobat, Excel and Word documents on your phone and read them easily. This capability becomes even more powerful coupled with the latest version of MOSS (Microsoft’s Office SharePoint Server) intranet software. Now, handheld users can see mobile versions of their KPI data, those all-important measures of performance.

Imagine you are at a client's office an hour away from your office. How much would it be worth to know that the prospect you've been trying to get in to see for months can see you today if you can be there in two hours? That's when you can quickly see the value of making a full-featured handheld part of your every day business outfit.

With these new mobile computing options there is no longer any question about whether we can be connected anytime, anywhere . Should we always be connected? Ah, that is a topic for another day.

At Chill we take the heat out of IT. No matter what pressure you are under, we will always keep our heads and make sure you get back up and running as soon as possible. So don't sweat - Chill IT. Click here for more information on our consulting services.

In Sydney or San Francisco, You're Connected

It used to be that people would ask each other, "How are you?" These days, the question is just as likely to be "Where are you?" For both business and pleasure, people today are highly mobile. But they are also highly busy, so being out of touch is not an option whether the trip is all the way to Geneva or just down the road to a grocery store.

Technology has not only kept up, it frequently leaps ahead of our mobile society's wants and needs. The development of laptop computers was a response to the need for portability. Built-in WiFi was a response to the need for those laptops to connect to the Internet. Now, building 3G ("third generation") modems into laptops means that users can access high-speed data services outside the range of their ISP by relying on the 3G wide area cellular telephone networks. With increased bandwidth and transfer rates, 3G allows for high-speed data exchange to handle Web-based applications, audio, and video files.

All that transmitting and receiving of data can add a feature that no one wants – security issues. Technology has an answer for that, too, of course: the Virtual Private Network (VPN). Imagine that you are sitting at your desk in an office, connected to the company's network through a little blue cable plugged in to your laptop. Imagine then that you pick up your laptop and take it home…with the cable still attached, still connecting you to the company's secure network. That's your VPN. Instead of a cable, though, you connect through the Internet to the company's private network just as if you were still at your desk. Except that you are sitting at home or on the beach or in a café.

The benefits to you are obvious – you can work anywhere and collaborate with colleagues just as if you were in the same building. For the company, there are many benefits:

• Global networking opportunities are increased.
• Travel costs are cut or eliminated for remote users
• Travel time and commuting stress are reduced
• Productivity improves along with employee satisfaction
• Overall operating costs are reduced
• VPNs are secure so confidential data can be shared safely

A few years ago, a small hand-held device became the badge of importance that marked executives and in-the-know technophiles. Now, less than 10 years since its debut, hundreds of millions of people seem to have a BlackBerry as a permanent attachment. It's no wonder, either. The BlackBerry includes a major improvement over the PDAs that went before. Instead of having to manually sync a PDA to your computer, the BlackBerry syncs itself continually over the Internet and cell phone network. So besides your phone calls, a BlackBerry brings email, calendar updates, and documents to the hand-held device.

Mobile computing options are expanding every year. Whether you prefer a hand-held BlackBerry type of phone/PDA, or a lightweight laptop with a G3 modem and a VPN, we can help you communicate and do business anywhere you go in today's connected world. So…where are you?

At Chill we take the heat out of IT. No matter what pressure you are under, we will always keep our heads and make sure you get back up and running as soon as possible. So don't sweat - Chill IT. Click here for more information on our consulting services.