Every business owner knows that a company’s IT is extremely important. As an owner, it is imperative that the IT for your company is: kept up to date, serviced properly and adequately protected. Protecting the technology that runs your company is protecting your company as a whole. In today’s business world, a business owner has many different options when it comes to managing and running their IT.
A good first step to take when trying to figure out how to manage your business’s IT is to create an IT budget, knowing the approximate cost of all of the different options available to you. Figuring out how much you can afford to spend on IT and how much you actually spend on IT a year will be essential in your decision making.
We have created a chart to help compare in-house costs associated with IT compared to different options available as well as the options that CyberTrails provides.
6 SERVICES COMPANIES REQUIRE:
IT SPECIALIST:
Managing Your IT In-House: The average annual salary of an IT Specialist is going to be around $60,000 plus benefits. You may need more than one IT specialist depending on your size and complexity.
Utilizing a Straight Colocation Center: When using the services of a colocation center, you get the benefits of a secure, redundant facility to house your equipment, but the up-keep and updating of your equipment is still your responsibility. So you are going to still need your IT specialist, starting at around $60,000 a year plus benefits.
Outsourcing Your IT Services: When you outsource your IT, you will be paying an average monthly rate that is specific and tailored to your company’s needs. This will obviously vary company by company. A company like CyberTrails is full of IT specialists, the best in the business. The primary reason many companies outsource with CyberTrails is that we pay their salaries and benefits while you get full access to all their knowledge and experience. Plus, we have our own Managed Colocation Facility that is open 24x7x365.
EQUIPMENT:
Managing Your IT In-House: The average small to medium sized business owner is going to spend about $1,500 per employee depending on the type of equipment your business requires. This cost includes the initial equipment purchases and software purchase for each employee. If your server equipment is kept at your office you need to factor in power, cooling, security, and maintenance.
Utilizing a Straight Colocation Center: You are still responsible for your equipment whether it is located at your office or in a Colocation Center. The cost per employee would not change in this scenario but you would need to factor in a monthly fee for the colocation space. Many companies prefer to have their server equipment housed at a colocation facility for the added protection it offers: redundant power, cooling, bandwidth and physical security layers.
Outsourcing Your IT Services: Outsourcing your IT gives you the option of leasing state-of-the-art equipment owned by a managed services company, for part or all of your needed hardware. With a leased server, you don’t have to worry about equipment breaking down or needing to be updated because it is monitored and maintained for you. You can also opt for a virtual server, or VM, which lets you customize and pay for only the server space that you need, and as your company expands you can adjust the VM to meet your needs without having to purchase new expensive equipment. CyberTrails is a Managed IT Service Provider that owns and operates their own state of the art Colocation Facility.
CLOUD ACCESSIBILITY:
Managing Your IT In-House: The average small to medium sized company is going to spend about $500 per year on cloud and other SAAS tools. You decide what you need, purchase it and install it on your equipment.
Utilizing a Straight Colocation Center: Colocation centers are great; they offer layers of security, redundancy and temperature control but what many of them don’t offer are Managed Services. This means that you are responsible for the configuration of your server, SAAS installs and any patches or updates.
Outsourcing Your IT Services: SAAS (software as a service) can be part of your package if you decide to outsource your IT to a colocation center that has managed services. This means that in our fee you are going to have access to many secure cloud services, and you will not have to worry about updates or having access to the latest and greatest. CyberTrails is ahead of the curve when it comes to offering cloud services to our clients.
MAINTENANCE:
Managing Your IT In-House: About half of an IT Specialist’s time is spent on maintenance. If you are looking at an IT Specialist with a $60k salary, if 44 hours per month are spent on maintenance you should expect to spend approximately $1,320 every single month just keeping all of your IT in working order.
Utilizing a Straight Colocation Center: Like we mentioned above, when your equipment is housed in a straight colocation facility that does not offer Managed Services, the maintenance is your responsibility.
Out Sourcing Your IT Services: This is probably the best argument for out sourcing your IT. It is such a worry free option. Utilizing a Managed Service provider, such as CyberTrails, enables you to focus on doing your job while we take care of your IT equipment. We handle server installs, configurations, monitoring, patch management, backup, disaster recovery, help desk, and help desk support for your employees.
SOFTWARE UPDATES/EQUIPMENT REPLACEMENT:
Managing Your IT In-House: If you have a smartphone or any tablet product, you know how important it is to stay on top of your updates. As a small to medium sized business owner, you can expect to spend approximately $150 a year on anti-virus and software updates. Keeping track of all needed updates and making sure they happen on all of the appropriate devices is important as well. All of your IT needs to be able to sync.
Utilizing a Straight Colocation Center: As with your maintenance, your cloud accessibility, your equipment updates and replacements etc., you are the one responsible for the software updates and equipment replacement. The cost will vary from year to year depending on what needs to be updated or replaced.
Outsourcing Your IT Services: Outsourcing your IT management means that you will not have to worry about software updates or equipment questions. With services such as Pro Services and Patch Management you can rest assured that updates and patches are kept current. If new equipment is necessary CyberTrails can help direct you with the exact specs on what you need and the most cost effective solution.
STORAGE/UPKEEP:
Managing Your IT In-House: Storing and up-keeping your sensitive IT equipment in-house leads to several different types of expenses and less peace-of-mind. You need to make sure you have the proper insurance and have a reliable alarm system. Your equipment needs to be in a temperature controlled room with plenty of air circulation and power dedicated to it. You also need to have everything backed-up should there be a fire, flood, or break-in.
Utilizing a Straight Colocation Center: Storing your equipment in a colocation center removes the physical protection and security worries. Your equipment is safe, but your company is still responsible for all of your management such as firewalls and back-up.
Outsourcing Your IT Services: Outsourcing your IT to a Managed Service company that also owns their own Colocation Facility, such as CyberTrails, gives a growing company the best of both worlds. Colocation provides the security, redundancy, and monitoring while Managed Services provides software updates, SAAS services, monitoring, cloud computing, expert IT consulting and much more.
So there you go, running a business in the modern world, where technology is a must, can be expensive and complicated. This is one of the reasons why a Managed Services company like CyberTrails is such an asset for small to medium-sized companies; outsourcing your IT enables a team of specialists to focus on the technology infrastructure freeing you up to concentrate on your core competencies and growing your business!
