Monitoring

Managed Service Provider

5 Amazing Benefits of a Managed Service Provider

Managed Service Providers – or MSPs – are often recommended as a cost effective IT solution for small businesses. For a minimal monthly fee, MSPs provide a reasonably priced solution to the complex technology pains of small businesses. Here’s a look at the various benefits an MSP can offer your business… Freed-Up Resources and a Renewed Emphasis on Core Business Both business owners and internal IT staff would much rather focus on revenue enhancing tasks like product development or the creation of cutting-edge applications and services. This is one reason routine monitoring and maintenance tasks are often neglected by an internal IT person or team, which always proves to be detrimental much later. Often misportrayed as a “threat” to an internal IT person or staff, MSPs can instead relieve internal staff of mundane network operations maintenance, repetitious monitoring of server and storage infrastructure, and day-to-day operations and help desk duties. With these tools, MSPs can help internal IT teams with monitoring, maintenance, and more. Outsourcing IT management to an MSP allows businesses to focus on their core competencies and strategic initiatives. By relieving the burden of day-to-day IT tasks, businesses can redirect their internal resources and expertise toward activities that drive revenue growth, customer satisfaction, and overall business success. Managed Service Providers Are A True Partner Sharing Risks And Responsibilities The goal of an MSP is to deliver on contracted services, measure, report, analyze and optimize IT service operations, and truly become an irreplaceable catalyst for business growth. Managed Service Providers not only assume leadership roles, they enable risk reduction, enhance efficiency and change the culture by introducing internal IT operations to new technologies and processes. MSPs are much more scalable than internal IT teams as well. Internal IT teams have a large cost associated with them, including insurance, training, and more. The ongoing relationship with an MSP has multiple benefits. MSPs act as a partner for your in-house team and a bridge between you and your vendors. They serve as a single point of contact for your business and become familiar with your company over time. Managed Service Providers Provide Access to Expertise, Best Practices and World-Class Tools and Technologies MSPs have experience with a variety of businesses and organizations. With that experience, Managed Service Providers can keep your business relevant and on track with continually evolving technology, support, and productivity demands. Let’s face it, no small or medium sized business can afford to fall behind with technology trends in today’s business world. With the large variety of experience MSPs can provide, a small business would have to have multiple employees to provide a similar amount of experience which can be very costly. MSPs stay up to date with the latest technology trends and advancements. They can help businesses leverage cutting-edge technologies, such as cloud computing, virtualization, artificial intelligence, and data analytics, to drive innovation and gain a competitive edge. MSPs can guide businesses in selecting and implementing the right technologies that align with their specific needs and goals. Preventative Maintenance Managed service providers focus on preventative maintenance and proactive monitoring and management of IT systems, networks, and infrastructure, keeping downtime for businesses to a minimum. They can identify and address potential issues before they become major problems, minimizing downtime and maximizing system availability. This compares to the older model of waiting for things to break before it is fixed. With preventative maintenance, you can avoid costly downtime and focus on preventing issues before they become a concern. With monitoring and preventative maintenance, costs are kept down as well. It’s much cheaper to prevent issues and having to call in support and fix something after it’s broke.  This proactive approach helps businesses maintain smooth operations and reduces the risk of costly IT disruptions. Managed Service Providers Provide the Benefit of a Full-Time Fully Staffed IT Department at a Fraction of the Cost Managed service providers are staffed with highly skilled IT professionals who possess a wide range of expertise and specialized knowledge in various technologies and industry best practices. By leveraging their expertise, businesses gain access to a team of professionals who can handle complex IT tasks and provide strategic guidance, ensuring that their technology infrastructure is optimized for efficiency and productivity. Most small business owners live and die by proactive management. They just haven’t had the budget, resources or access to on-demand expertise to be proactive with information technology management. A Managed Service Provider gives business owners and overwhelmed internal IT staff affordable computer and server support, remote monitoring of critical network components like servers and firewalls, data backup and disaster recovery, network security, custom software solutions, and technology evaluation and planning. Managed Service Providers can decrease the overall IT support costs by as much as 30% to 50%. Rather than being stressed about technology, business owners can instead get back to focusing on growing their business. All while enjoying the benefits of highly-trained IT experts boosting their network’s reliability and performance. 5 Amazing Benefits of a Managed Service Provider Conclusion Overall, partnering with an MSP offers businesses the advantages of expert IT support, improved system performance and security, cost efficiencies, scalability, and the ability to focus on core business functions. It enables businesses to leverage external expertise, technologies, and resources to optimize their IT infrastructure and drive long-term growth. If you’re looking for a new IT partner, then contact Pennyrile Technologies for a free consultation and see how we can help your business today!

5 Amazing Benefits of a Managed Service Provider Read More »

Partner with an MSP

Mitigate Costly New Technology Risks for Continued Stability and Profitability

Partnering with a managed service provider (MSP) is one new approach being used by many companies like yours. Experienced MSPs have access to newer tools that reduce costs by automating many routine in-house labor intensive processes. Break-fix is labor intensive, and labor is one of the most expensive operating costs within your IT infrastructure. The new innovative tools that can be provided by MSPs generate real productivity increases and mitigate the risk of network failure, downtime and data loss from human error. MSP Services MSPs deliver a trusted foundation for your team and your customers. Some of the services and tasks offered include: Remote Desktop Management and Support Predictable Management of Critical Patches and Software Updates Fractional Resource Availability of Best-In-Class Expertise – scaled to your needs Implementing and Testing Backup and Disaster Recovery Processes Performance of Inventory and Audits of Computer/Network/Software Enforcement of Network/Security Policy Monitoring of Network/Operating System and Alerts Updating Anti-Virus Software and Detecting Spyware Erase any misconception that managed service providers are nothing more than “outsourced” tech help priced to displace your in-house IT technician or team. The new MSP has defined new methodologies and technology partnerships to offer valuable preventative services that proactively locate and eliminate threats before a bigger problem arises. MSPs today put considerable effort into understanding the operational and business needs of SMBs to develop and deliver a set of specific services that align technology with the SMB’s business objectives. This is the reason you hear managed services often referred to as “partners.” A present day MSP offers quantifiable economic value, greater ROI and decreased total cost of operation by streamlining costs and eliminating unnecessary lost productivity, revenue, and avoidable on-site IT consultant fees, in addition to eliminating the need for costly hardware/software repairs or replacement.

Mitigate Costly New Technology Risks for Continued Stability and Profitability Read More »

thumb 1

Five Things To Preserve Your Network and Systems

Small & medium-sized businesses (SMBs) today are under attack from malware, ransomware, external threats and data breaches. But with the lack of sophistication around most SMBs security stance, the prospect of remaining unaffected by attacks is bleak. Here are five things SMBs can do to help preserve their networks and systems. While this list does not completely cover all aspects of protecting a network, these are great first steps. If you need assistance, a managed service provider (MSP) like Pennyrile Technologies can help. A managed service provider delivers services, such as network, application, infrastructure and security, via ongoing and regular support and active administration on customers’ premises, in their MSP’s data center (hosting), or in a third-party data center. Backup Files Every Day  As catastrophic as data loss is, the number of businesses that still are not backing up the computers and servers on their network is unbelievable. According to the Symantec Small to Medium Size Businesses (SMB) data, only 23% of SMBs are backing up their data on a daily basis and fewer than 50% are backing up data weekly. Any number of events can result in data loss, so the importance of frequently backing up your network cannot be overstated. Losing any amount of data can compromise your personal identity, lead to downtime for your business and employees, and even bankrupt your entire company. Ensure Backup Procedures Are Checked Regularly Many times business owners think that they have a backup system in place only to find out after it’s too late that it hasn’t been working properly. It may seem like your files are being backed up daily, however, the backup could have become corrupt or it is not backing up huge chunks of critical data. Check your backup procedures regularly to ensure they are working properly in order to be sure that ALL of your data can be recovered. In the age of BYOD (Bring-Your-Own-Devices) it is also important to frequently backup data on your employee’s personal laptops, iPads or Blackberrys, so make sure you have a procedure in place to check those backups as well. Make Sure Updated Virus Protection and Firewalls Are Always Enabled Far too many companies either have no virus protection, expired virus software licenses, or disabled virus programs that aren’t running at all. This makes their business technology vulnerable to virus attacks from emails, spam, data downloads, and un-reputable websites. Further, because of inadequate firewall protection about 40% of small to medium businesses will have their network accessed by a hacker. Chances are, when these businesses are attacked they will be entirely unaware it is happening. In order to protect your valuable data and assets, ensure your virus protection is adequate, up-to-date and functioning properly and that your firewall is intact. Finally, don’t forget to update security patches and change passwords when an employee leaves in order to deter hacking attempts. Monitor Server Drives Dangerously full server drives can bring their own set of problems – ranging from program and server crashes to sluggish email delivery. Proactive monitoring and maintenance of your servers can spare your business a lot of problems down the road. And don’t just monitor to see if the drives are full, but also monitor for hard drive failures, or predicted failures to help avoid data loss. Replacing drives with predicted failures can save your business time and money by avoiding extended downtime. Regularly Check Critical Built-In Logs Very few problems with technology emerge suddenly. These problems typically progress over time and evolve into more serious problems. Frequently review your critical built-in log files to help identify the problem before it has gotten out of control and wreaks havoc on your business infrastructure.

Five Things To Preserve Your Network and Systems Read More »