Is the stock market going up or down in 2010? If only we were able to control the DOW or Nasdaq then we wouldn't have to worry about the success of our small businesses. But, since the market is going to do what it wants we should focus on what we can control. With the recent economic slowdown the majority of us are looking at possible cuts in our year end budgets. One of the key expenses for all busiesses including our own is Information Services. As I'm reviewing our budget for 2010 I thought I'd share some of the information technology changes we implemented internally in 2009.
After going through all of our monthly expenditures we discovered two subscription services which we paid monthly fees on could be written internally without loosing any functionality. These were our (time-clock) and (newsletter) applications. Although in this instance writing our own internal software required more up-front cost it will pay for itself over three years so will prove to be a great investment.
Through our experience with the hundreds of small businesses we work for there has to be a good mix between leased services & paying outright for products or services. If your business model was to lease all items, you would probably over-pay on some items, and if you paid outright for everything cash flow could be an issue. This balance caused us to sign a new lease in 2009 for our mass mailing equipment. New equipment was $25,000 and we did not want to claim that in this fiscal year. So our productivity increased in our mailings and the monthly fee is not breaking the bank.
Our primary billing software installed 5 years ago was becoming outdated. The upgrade cost was $12,000 for the software licenses. Although the new software had some updates in it, it still lacked a couple of features which we have always wanted. So the decision was made to write a new front-end for the software and leave the database as is. This was a cost savings of $3,000 versus upgrading the software. Besides the cost savings we also added two new exciting features. The first was the ability to customize billing reports online and the second was the ability to access the system from our mobile smart-phones.
So wether you are a Bull or a Bear about the future of the market, always be bullish towards your own business and be proactive on those capital expenditures. Iowa Solutions can assist in several ways regarding these costs. From the basic Quarterly Maintenance service we provide to complete Server Hosting systems which provide a 100% fixed cost for your server/workstation technolgy. We also have a very strong software & web development team which can assist in improving alot of internal processes at a cost alot less than you think.
Author: Josh