5 Penny-Pinching Ideas For 2008

January 7, 2008 by Rich | 6 Comments
In Ideas, Productivity, Strategy

In business, I’ve learned that much technology is overhyped and misrepresented. Every day I deal with stuff that doesn’t work as promised. But there’s a bright spot: Even in the vast wasteland of crappy software and unreliable hardware, I have found some penny-pinching technology recommendations that are worth considering for 2008.

1. Increase your network bandwith. Faster is better. The faster you can enter an invoice, print a check, or record a customer order, the faster you can get on to the next productive task. Technology gets faster and faster every year. Make your network go faster and you’ll immediately save a few bucks.

2. Set up remote access. Work isn’t done just between the four walls of your office. Get with the program! People like to do work over lattes. They like to access their files while driving down the turnpike. They want to send e-mails while getting a lap dance. Remote access tools are inexpensive and easy to deploy.

3. Create a few key reports. Come up with three to five key reports you want to see every day or week. Hire someone to come in and write up the reports. A couple of grand spent on a few decent reports will save you many times over in better management of your orders, quotes, expenses, etc.

4. Avoid Vista. Delay getting Vista until the hardware really catches up. Just say no to nonfunctioning programs and incompatible devices! Microsoft will be releasing their first service pack to Vista in 2008 and that should make it ready for prime time. But you’ve got better things to do than monkey with an operating system that, for the time being, costs more than it returns.

5. Outsource your phone systems. For about $12 per month per mailbox we get the whole phone system, complete with automated attendant, call forwarding, voicemail, etc. The best thing is that no one calling us knows we’ve outsourced! Even the automated attendant has an American accent! We don’t have to worry about maintaining our own system or paying through the nose for a phone lease. Check out gotvmail.com for price comparisons.

For five more penny-pinching ideas, go here.

Photo by Wikimedia.org.

Comments

Adam Holland on January 7th, 2008 at 9:33 pm

amen to vista.. what a piece of crap… i never want to upgrade..
Beautiful Minds on January 7th, 2008 at 10:04 pm

cool.., I like the tips.. especially the fourth one.. Vista is of no good until u have the compatible hardware and even software.. some of the existing software you are using in your business will stop functioning.. :(
Paul M. on January 8th, 2008 at 1:11 am

Yes, don’t buy Vista, buy MacOS X. I have done it recenlty and I am over the moon. I spend time on working instead of fixing my wireless connection etc.

BTW, my blog is worth $7,000. How do you calculate that?
Leon on January 8th, 2008 at 5:58 am

In agreement with all points. The Vista one in particular.
Entrepreneur on January 8th, 2008 at 6:25 am

By far the worst thing MS has done is Vista. It is the clunkiest software yet. And stupid us (well, I use a Mac but the rest of the staff use PCs), even upgraded Office- what a nightmare of incompatibility! And because all the buttons we’ve all gotten used to have suddenly morphed into something else, its been horrible on productivity.

Down with Vista- even with the upgrade. Save some real money- get a Mac, hahahah
afullpensieve on January 10th, 2008 at 11:16 am

Seconding the comments about Vista aside, I think it’ll eventually catch up, just as XP did before.

But the real kicker is comment #5. No more receptionists, no more handwritten phonelogs and delayed “who called when” text messages, and less hassle. Even the big dogs are learning that trick, as I heard fedex uses gotvmail as well.