Nobody wants to spend more than they have to, especially when it comes to those necessary evils like bills, utilities, insurance, and the general costs of keeping things running smoothly. The goal is to provide outstanding enterprise-level solutions for small business prices.

Let’s talk about a few ways to cut long term IT costs. Typically you can’t simply cut costs unless you make a little investment first. For example, while improving the insulation and replacing the windows in your home is an expensive endeavour, in the long run it can reduce your energy bills.

Think of your investment in IT the same way.

Virtualize

If your business requires multiple servers that perform various tasks, it’s more than likely you have multiple powerful servers that are being completely underutilized. Virtualization solves this by consolidating these devices onto hardware that houses multiple virtual environments. This means there’s less to manage, less heat generated, and less power consumed. As long as your server has plenty of resources, it’s even possible to add additional virtual servers to it as your needs increase, without the big expense of purchasing new hardware.

Establish Energy Saving Policies

Todays’ computer equipment is much more energy efficient compared to a few years ago. If you have some older technology (CRT monitors) still chugging away, then you are consuming more electricity than you need to be. The difference won’t necessarily be staggering but shaving a few cents a day adds up, and the investment eventually pays for itself.

Consider setting policies that will dim or shutdown monitors when they are not being used (after-hours and weekends), and if you don’t need remote access to your workstations on the weekend, use policies to shut them down and conserve power.

Refresh Your Hardware

Time is money. Those older, slow workstations that you still have floating around are costing your company money because the low productivity effects the way people work; and older computers tend to be more expensive to take care of. We’ve found that in most situations refreshing your hardware every 3-4 years is the sweet spot for cost effectiveness.

Switch to VOIP    

Voice over IP phone systems can drastically reduce costs in communication. VoIP systems are scalable and extremely feature-rich and offer a lot of benefits on their own. Businesses can save up to 50% compared to traditional phone bills.

Outsource and Manage Your IT

In most cases those annoying day-to-day IT issues can be prevented with just a little regular maintenance. Any reputable IT company will have core processes and tools in place to streamline this maintenance, and can provide these services for a fraction of what you’d pay an in-house IT guru.

If you are frustrated by the lack of Performance, Reliability and Security of your computer systems and would like to discover how great IT support can be, connect with Bob at CSGMAX@CascadiaSystemsGoup.com, or give us a call – 604.270.1730.

Your comments are appreciated – ComputerCents@CascadiaSystemsGroup.com