Executive Summary
- Managing your company’s IT support budget can be a bit of a balancing act, especially when you want to maintain levels of service.
- In this guide, we’ll share 5 effective ways to optimise your IT support budget without having to cut essential services or impact the customer experience.
- Small things can go a long way when it comes to saving money, and there’s plenty a small business can do to ensure budgets are being allocated optimally.
Introduction
How do you make your IT support budget go further as a business?
Arbitrary cost-cutting can be detrimental to service, so there has to be a better way, right?
Right.
In today’s article, we’re going to share 5 techniques you can employ to optimise your IT budget — rather than just slashing it. In this way, you’ll be able to maintain a high level of service (to customers and employees) and keep an eye on the pennies and pounds.
#1: Make the switch to subscription-based software
There was a time when business software was a bit like a ticking timebomb.
On the day a new edition of an essential business tool was released, life was good. Everything ran smooth and fast with a whole host of new features to enjoy. Over time, though, these standalone products would slow down, their features would seem a little less shiny, and they’d eventually become more of a liability than an asset. All of this comes at a cost to productivity. On top of that, you or your IT support team would need to spend the time upgrading to the new version – and paying for it in a lump sum for the licenses.
The more modern way to do this is with “Software as a Service”, or SaaS, products. Microsoft 365 is a great example. Rather than buying “Office 2022”, you simply pay one flat monthly payment and get all the updates, all the new features, and all the security you need automatically. No need to shop for new software or deal with old, out-of-date tools. To us, that’s a great way to optimise your IT support costs.
#2: Review your current IT strategy roadmap — especially around hardware
As we covered quite recently on the Get Support blog, your IT roadmap serves as an essential guiding light for your business and your technology spending.
There can come a time, however, when you hit diminishing returns, particularly regarding your company’s hardware provision. This touches on the age-old debate of ‘repair or replace’, but realistically, it will almost always be more cost-effective in the long run to replace hardware, whether desktops or laptops, before they become so slow and ineffective that they start to negatively impact employee productivity.
#3: Ensure any outsourced IT support is cost-effective
It goes without saying that one of the best ways to save on long-term business costs for IT support is to engage the services of an outsourced IT department. But not all outsourced IT support services are created equally – and some may even cost you more in the long run.
As we’ve covered in a previous article here on the Get Support blog, organisations have a choice between a break-fix provider and a Managed Service Provider (MSP). You can learn more about the differences between these models in our previous article, but the short version is that relying on a break-fix (i.e. a ‘pay as you go’ IT company) can be very expensive over time. The more IT support you need, the more it will cost you.
By contrast, working with a Managed Service Provider can deliver big cost savings as time goes on – especially compared to the cost of hiring in an entire IT department with all associated staffing costs. With an MSP, the more IT support you need, the price remains the same – so there’s no need to worry about spiralling or hidden costs.
#4: Invest in a hybrid working model (as long as it suits your business)
It goes without saying that people are often the largest investment a company will make, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t savings and optimisations to be made.
The recent shift to hybrid and even fully remote working was a matter of necessity during a pandemic, but many organisations have discovered that having a fully or partially remote team can spell savings on things like IT budgets. That’s because you may be able to reduce hardware and software investments on-premises, including server management and monitoring, and instead rely on more cost-effective solutions such as an outsourced IT support team.
#5: Assess all of your IT tools and remove any redundancy
How sure are you that your business is making the most of all of your software and digital tools?
When we ask this question of our clients, they can often be surprised at exactly how much of their budget can be wasted on software they don’t use. For example, perhaps an employee needed a specific tool for a certain project — photo editing software, perhaps — and they no longer actively use it. But your company may still be paying hundreds or thousands for the annual license.
By reviewing and eliminating any unused or unnecessary software, you can make your IT support budget go further.
Save time and money with a Managed Service Provider you can trust
We hope these 5 tips will put you on the path to an optimised IT support budget, but if you still have questions or concerns about your making the most of IT, we can help.
We offer low-cost monthly IT support agreements with no long-term contracts as standard, meaning your business can enjoy flexible IT support without one-off or hidden fees along the way.
Want to talk more about how Get Support could help your business? Call us today on 01865 594 000 or just fill in the form at the bottom of this page.
