Information is the key ingredient to running our businesses. It can come in many forms; however we are not really using that information to make informed accurate decisions and connect with out customers easily. This article will help explain why a lot of businesses do not really have key business information at their fingertips and suggest ways in which you really can drive your business by moving your information online.
What information are we talking about?
There are two types of information that are being referred to here:
1. Communication
The ways in which you communicate with others using email, calendar and contacts
2. Documents
The files, spreadsheets, images and videos that you use to describe your products and services.
The challenges to having an efficient business
Historically business information used to be neatly organised and stored on servers or individual computers in offices…then along came the Internet and the multitude of devices (computers, phones, laptops, tablets) to help us access and manage that information. The problem is that businesses are not aware of how to organise this data across devices. In fact by having various devices often leads to having duplicated subsets of the information scattered across different locations and it can really be a challenge to pull together that data and make informed decisions.
Companies these days are also spending far too much time and money on IT to manage business information. An unnecessary amount is spent on support contracts for storage and backups, not to mention revenue spent on software and hardware upgrades. For the small business owner who can’t afford expensive systems, they are often left juggling the many devices, plugging in cables to keep all the information up to date; when in reality there is no need to do this.
Now there are greater opportunities for smaller businesses to work together, merging different skill sets to present products and services to clients. But how can we effectively collaborate on projects if we can’t even manage our own information easily?
The Internet and the devices that we have provide us with an opportunity to become more flexible, work more freely on a mobile basis and to have a lot more fun. However not many businesses are really taking advantage of these working methods; instead relying on the old ways of working which produce the same results-someone famous defined that as “insanity”.
In my next blog, I will be sharing with you just how something that has been around for over 15 years can solve the problem and help us to really supercharge our businesses. Its called the internet and many companies are all ready using it to store and communicate their information, creating major cost savings, establishing more flexible working methods and a truely mobile way of working.
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