Small businesses often run on very tight budgets and the thought of outsourcing certain services is rarely appealing. However, while the temptation to manage things like IT and computer networking in-house is there, it is often a mistake.

In the case of information technology, small businesses often rely on someone within the company who “knows a bit about computers” to maintain their voice and data network, internet connection and email systems. It makes sense to these small businesses because it means they don’t have to employ a specialist and their overheads are much lower as a result.

The problem with doing this, however, is that when something goes wrong one or both of two things usually happens.

Firstly, because the person responsible for the IT services is not an expert it can take hours to fix. This will lead to lost business as potential customers cannot visit the company website, cannot complete online transactions, cannot get an email through or cannot even call the company as the phones are down!

The longer one or more of these services is out of action, the more money the company loses.

Secondly, once the person “who knows a bit about computers” has spent a few hours looking at the problem but has failed to fix it, he or she will usually turn to expert, external help – which costs a lot of money in call out charges, time spent and potentially even replacement hardware.

The overall cost of this sort of downtime will usually far outweigh the cost of outsourcing IT support but this is not often seen by small business owners. The cost is all they see, not the benefits.

Yet the benefits of outsourced IT support are substantial. It begins with setting up voice and data networks, as well as implementing security measures to ensure data is safe and backed up.

A well built network, comprising telephone system, computer network, security and internet and email systems and access is likely to experience far less downtime than a poorly built one, meaning a massive reduction in lost business and revenue.

The ongoing support and maintenance does come at a cost, but the knowledge that a business has 24 hour access to IT experts to resolve any problems, repair damaged hardware and maintain software provides great peace of mind.

This kind of support is available on the phone, via remote access and even through onsite visits where and when required, further reducing downtime and lost business.

Finally, when that small business begins to grow and requires expansion of its IT systems or new technologies, hardware and software to be implemented, their IT support company is on hand to advise on the best approach, the best upgrades and new software and to procure and install the new systems.

This kind of ongoing support is essential to a business that wants to experience the least amount of growing pains and maximise its potential in terms of customer support, sales and revenue.

So if you run a small business take a close look at your IT systems and consider very carefully the benefits of outsourcing your IT support. You are very likely to find they significantly outweigh the costs.

Author Bio: Ian Grainger is writing on behalf of Efuse, providers of cost effective small business IT support.

Category: Business Management
Keywords: small business, it support, it maintenance, network support