Small Businesses, Ditch the DIY Approach to Technology

A recent market study performed by the U.S. Small Business Administration revealed some disconcerting information. According to the study, the majority of small businesses recognize that technologies are changing businesses across industries and agree that technology could be leveraged to achieve better outcomes for their respective organizations. However, in spite of this, 66% of small businesses employ a “do-it-yourself” approach to technology, and 33% have no IT support at all! This serious discrepancy between small businesses’ IT needs and their IT resources needs to be remedied. The Dilemma As alarming as those statistics are, we can understand why so many small business owners adopt the DIY approach. For one thing, small businesses have much more limited resources than large corporations. A more modest budget simply cannot stretch to fund a full-time, specialized IT staff. For another, entrepreneurs tend to be incredibly busy and have no time to acquire the necessary technological expertise to fill that void themselves. So where does that leave these businesses? They employ a minimal staff, if that, of IT generalists. Without specialists, these organizations adopt a break/fix, reactive approach to security, underestimating their vulnerability to security threats. Furthermore, because such IT infrastructures are not scalable, any growth these businesses experience only serves to further complicate, convolute and slow their technological landscape. In short, the DIY approach seems to be the affordable, but completely ineffective, choice. The Solution How can small businesses access the high-level IT resources they need at prices they can afford? Managed Service Providers (MSPs) present the much-needed solution. MSPs provide big-business IT solutions for budgets of all sizes; they offer expert, proactive IT support but through a variety of remote and on-site services. In this way, small businesses receive the specialized support of a full-time IT staff, without actually financing a full-time IT staff. Better still, small businesses can tailor managed services to address their specific requirements: they don’t have to pay for anything they don’t need. Essentially, with the same resources, small businesses can leverage IT managed services to build robust, proactive security operations and scale their IT infrastructures to achieve growth goals and to grow with them. Small businesses constitute the vast majority of businesses, employ almost half the private workforce and fuel innovation and enterprise in this country. Because of this, at AIS, we feel that you deserve better. Small business owners, ditch the DIY approach to technology. Switch to an IT Managed Service Provider to benefit from proactive, strategic technology solutions—at a small business cost. Reach out to AIS today to start the process.