You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know

While each business is unique, many companies share a number of common pain points around Information Technology (IT):  

• Too much time spent dealing with IT infrastructure and technology – time that could be devoted to serving their customers or clients. 
• Delayed or misdirected email messages. 
• Outages that shut down entire departments – or the whole company.  
• Viruses, malware, or ransomware attacks that result in critical data loss.   

While revenue loss is terrible, these pain points are often not so much about money as they are about shortcomings in service quality from IT service providers.

Failure to address these pain points carries significant risks. Many small business owners are unaware of the hidden costs of not getting optimal essential services from their IT providers. They think they’re doing well enough because they don’t hear complaints from their staff or customers. They don’t know what they don’t know. 

They may be overcharged for the services they receive. Or worse, they aren’t contracting for the services they need, leaving their company and data needlessly exposed to unauthorized access or other hazards. The fact is that any effective IT management services must include four essential components: Device and Server Management, Security Management, Network Administration Management, and Backup Management.

• User Devices and Server Management: Outdated software often runs poorly on updated hardware – and lacks many innovations and new features. It can also pose risks – such as data loss or worse, which can put a dent in your company’s bottom line.
• Security Management: Ransomware attacks have become more prevalent in the last few years, with estimates that there is a ransomware attack on a business every 14 seconds. More mundane attacks such as viruses, malware, and Trojans are constant risks for any computer or network connected to the Internet. Other security management factors include document encryption, VPN protection for Wi-Fi connections, and password management.
• Network Management: The coronavirus pandemic means more people are working from home, making remote network access a must. Network management features, including monitoring, wireless inventory, and firewall management, are also mandatory for any managed IT service – with or without remote workers.
• Backup Management: Operating an IT network without backup is asking for catastrophic data loss. It’s not a matter of if, but when hard drive failures, natural disasters, or a nasty malware attack could happen. Backup management should be standard operating procedure for any business that operates an IT network.

The baseline IT management package for Red Road Networks includes all of these essentials.  Many of our customers find our baseline package to be more robust than our competitors’ baseline packages. Contact us today to set up a no-risk, no-obligation assessment.