IT support is as essential as technology for all businesses. When looking for an IT partner or Managed IT provider or Outsourced IT support for your small business or accounting or dental or medical firm here are some of the essential IT services to expect from your provider.
What if You have a Current Managed IT provider?
Businesses that have a current provider and aren’t sure if they are ready to make the can use this article as a guide for what to expect from Outsourced IT services providers in Melbourne.
Why do Businesses Depend on Managed IT Services?
When it comes to IT support here are some of the tips for business managers, aimed at improving the productivity in your business using Information Technology.
What type of IT services Does Your Managed Service Provider (MSP) Offer?
Business owners can look at the services they are currently using to meet their IT Strategy including IT services and IT goals. They will require these on a daily basis. The employees will need the most IT support for these IT services. Some of the common IT services in most businesses are:
- Cloud computing
- Microsoft 365
- Data backup and data recovery
- Cyber Security
- Website Design
If your company is thinking of introducing new IT products, can your current technology provider support your IT systems, or have you outgrown the outsourced IT provider? Can your IT support company also sort out IP telephony, cyber security, wireless internet, website, or trending technology like Artificial Intelligence or new automation technology? A responsible IT support company, will try and take over as much workload as possible for your needs.
Do the IT Support Company Support Hybrid Workforce?
The pandemic played important role in the shift towards cloud and work from home technology. This business trend is expected to continue after the pandemic and office workers are expected to work from mobile and office places. Managed IT providers that focus on remote workplaces have an advantage over traditional IT support providers.
With some IT providers, there would be no additional charges to support and get remote workers set up, others were charging for everything per hour. What IT support do they have any if the home wireless has issues or their broadband goes down or they get a virus on the home machine?
All questions that should be asked and answered clearly in the Service Level Agreement(SLA) which is also the official contract between parties.
How Does the Managed IT Services Provider Deal with Issues and Breaches?
If your business has a security breach, it could be a phishing email or ransomware attack, invoice fraud, cyber security incidents then how does the Outsourced IT company recover things from backups and fixes the issue?
After the incident is fixed, does the company investigate the issues? What about looking at why the IT issues and IT breakdowns that happened in the first place? Are they making any cyber security recommendations on preventing IT breakdowns again?
After the incident, company staff may need to follow recommendations that go beyond just resetting everybody’s passwords. Did your IT support provider ever find a hole in your IT security that allowed this thing to happen in the first place? Better IT security comes in all forms, even if it’s a recommendation that your staff all just need to take awareness training so that they stay alert.
When it comes to breaches and does the managed provider (MSP) report that breach to their customers, serious or not? It could be a low IT breach or something serious, then it would have been quite obvious to take action.
How Mature are they in Delivering their IT Services?
When businesses are seeking Outsourced IT providers they should be looking at their managed services pricing. Many managed IT support companies use complicated pricing options that confuse clients. This type of pricing includes different plans and packages and many IT services. There could be IT support packages like Gold, Silver, Bronze, or Platinum.
The end goal for firms is to get one final offering with all the IT services they require, does your outsourced IT provider do that? If a client pays either per user or per device per month, does that include the full IT support or partial IT support? Do they provide casual IT support or onsite services in your geographical region or its remote IT services only?
When a managed IT provider provides essential and full IT support for their pricing, it works best for firms rather than charging for different services separately and extra charges. This way the client is happy with the IT service they provide to businesses.
Managed IT providers with a multitude of options for their customers show they haven’t matured to that model and perhaps are willing to bend a bit to take on clients. IT support packages with one single service and customer paying fixed pricing per month for IT support is the best for business. It doesn’t matter how big or small the firms are or how many devices, the cost should be to pay X per device and you get a complete service.
It’s simple pricing, simple for business, simple for staff. If the company has its vision set on one IT strategy, one objective, one goal, one service, they can then focus on their business or their core.
Does It Support a Company that has a Digital Marketing Strategy?
By IT support company has a marketing strategy. A quick point here is to look at their social media accounts or the company website. Do they share original content using real photos of their staff and customers on other social news feeds or is it just full of the same old corporate stock photography?
Is it boring content that every single other company out there shares? Digital marketing is a way to show your online personality and what does it show about your IT support company. Are they different from others in the Managed IT services trade?
When it comes to their social media channels are they share free articles, media, and content online and YouTube channels and social media posts.
Do they educate their clients about their IT products and services? When you look at IT support marketing, are they genuinely putting out good educational content around how to protect yourself with cybersecurity or Outsourced IT Services?
Are they producing detailed, informative, truly educational content marketing material that is totally free of sales pitches and marketing spills and lead magnets? If all of IT support providers’ social media presence and marketing is just full of just selling more stuff, then perhaps they care more about digital marketing and new customers rather than they do actually educating, improving, and providing value to their existing customers.
If they are constantly doing webinars explaining their own products and services, it does not actually benefit the end-user which is the business owner.
Conclusion
In conclusion, over 70% of Australian businesses depend on reliable IT partners for their business. Business managers are seeking value by going with IT Support companies who will look after them. Managed IT providers are responsible for improving business productivity using technology and increasing the chances of achieving success and growth.
Tags: it supportit support costmanaged it servicesoutsourced IT services