Tech Tips for Business Owners

Mobile Device Safety Tips For Commercial Printing Executives

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Image of a mobile phone with a chain and padlock on it as a symbol of mobile device safety

Mobile Device Safety Tips For Commercial Printing Executives

It is safe to say that most executives of commercial printing businesses are tied to their mobile phones. Given the sensitive nature of the customer data they sometimes have to manage and communicate, mobile device safety is very important.

Commercial printing executives sometimes have a crazy schedule, and usually have to deal with the erratic demands from customers who want the job done now, on the fly – even when Print-on-Demand customers submit design materials late, or approve proofs at the last minute.

Mobile devices come in handy for looking up requests for quotes, proof approvals, sending files to customers, and browsing websites. At times, when there is a little break from the hectic schedule, mobile devices allow us to keep in contact with friends and family, buy stuff, and pay bills.

Mobile devices can be a double-edged sword. They allow us to store data, contact information, photos, emails and files; and when we can afford to take breaks, provide a source for entertainment.

They could also be a major source of headaches by exposing users to malicious software.

Not managing their usage properly can lead to situations where all that personal information and valuable data, not to mention the information of customers and partners, could be at risk.

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Prevent Downtime, Keep Cyber Thieves At Bay, and Prepare For Disaster

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How Organizations Can Prevent Downtime And Ensure That Even If Cyber Thieves Keep A-Knockin’, They Can’t Come In

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Small businesses and organizations in Round Rock, Texas and surrounding cities can prevent downtime, keep cyber thieves at bay, and prepare for disaster by implementing simple backup and disaster recovery strategies.

A study presented at the International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks showed that small-business networks are attacked every 39 seconds by some type of hacker or malicious software. Thankfully, having the proper firewall and office network security tools can prevent even the most determined cyber hacker from getting his hands on your network. Are your systems covered?

Does your organization have someone looking after the network who knows what they’re doing? Or is the IT position assigned to the so-called “Accidental IT Person” – an ad hoc position taken on by whoever knows the most about computers? The danger  of not being able to prevent downtime here is that if this person has a full-time job, perhaps as the office manager, or graphic designer, they won’t necessarily be keeping everything locked down and updated.

A good way to prevent downtime is to have a dedicated IT person on staff, or outsource the task to a local computer service company. By leveraging an IT services provider, you will have access to a team of qualified experts.

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10 Small Business Network Disaster Planning Essentials

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Image of business people sitting around a table discussing disaster recovery planning options.

If your critical data is important to your business and you cannot afford to have your operations halted for days – even weeks – due to data loss or corruption, then you need to read this report on disaster planning and act on the information shared.

A disaster can happen at any time on any day and is likely to occur at the most inconvenient time. If you aren’t already prepared, you run the risk of having the disaster coming before you have in place a plan to handle it.

This report will outline 10 things you should have in place to make sure your business could be back up and running again in the event of a disaster.

1. Have a Written Plan

As simple as it may sound, just thinking through in ADVANCE what needs to happen if your server has a meltdown or a natural disaster wipes out your office, will go a long way in getting it back fast.

At a minimum, the plan should contain details on what disaster could happen and a step-by-step process of what to do, who should do it and how. Also include contact information for various providers and username and password information for various key web sites.

Writing this plan will also allow you to think about what you need to budget for backup, maintenance and disaster recovery. If you can’t afford to have your network down for more than a few hours, then you need a plan that can get you back up and running within that time frame.

You may want the ability to virtualize your server, allowing the office to run off of the virtualized server while the real server is repaired. If you can afford to be down for a couple of days, there are cheaper solutions.  Once written, print out a copy and store it in a fireproof safe, an offsite copy (at your home) and a copy with your IT consultant.

2. Hire a Trusted Professional to Help You

Trying to recover your data after a disaster without professional help is business suicide; one misstep during the recovery process can result in forever losing your data or result in weeks of downtime. Make sure you work with someone who has experience in both setting up business contingency plans (so you have a good framework from which you CAN restore your network) and experience in data recovery.

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7 Critical Mobile Computing Security Measures for Nonprofits

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Business Advisory Report Reveals 7 Critical Security Measures Every Nonprofit Must Put In Place NOW With Mobile Computing

7 Critical Mobile Computing Security MeasuresThere’s no doubt about it – the Internet and mobile computing and cloud computing have made our lives easier and our nonprofit organizations more productive, cost-effective and competitive. But make no mistake about it: the Internet is also a breeding ground for thieves and predators, not to mention an enormous distraction and liability if not used properly.

It is causing people to be casual, careless and flat-out stupid about their privacy in an increasingly litigious society where heavy fines and severe reputational damage can occur with one slip up – which is why you cannot be casual or careless about introducing it to your nonprofit organization. You can’t turn on the TV or read a newspaper without learning about the latest online data breach. And mobile devices are easily misplaced and stolen.

Because of all of this, if you are going to allow employees to use mobile computing devices – particularly personal mobile devices – to access, store and use the data of your nonprofit organization, then it’s critical that you have these 7 security measures in place.

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How Associations Can Use Hardware-as-a-Service

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Hardware-as-a-Service Can Enable Membership Associations Use Latest Technology Without Paying A Fortune

Hardware-as-a-Service for Business ProfitabilityToday’s technology is changing at a very rapid pace, and it can become very expensive for small business owners to keep up. Whether is a processor, memory, hard drives, Point-of-Sale systems, or even network and  mobile devices, it is becoming tougher to keep up.

To compound the problem, vendors offer solutions with hefty price tags that make it difficult for the small business owner to afford. The end result is the tendency to “In-Source” I.T. responsibilities to a “technology-savvy” employee who quickly becomes frustrated, overworked and under-utilized.

The outcome of this scenario is the overwhelming number of small business environments with ill-maintained computer networks that are out of date in terms of security patches, backups, updates and a coherent licensing structure.

At the end of the day, the business is hurt in several ways:

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Solve E-mail Problems And Save Money With Hosted Microsoft Exchange

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How Hosted Exchange Can Solve All Your E-mail Problems While Saving You BIG Money

Solve E-mail Problems And Save Money With Hosted ExchangeIf you are a small to medium sized business that has frequent e-mail problems including servers going down, slow performance, too many spam e-mails and high IT support and software costs, read on.

Hosted Microsoft Exchange email service is often a much cheaper and easier way of getting rid of all these issues at a much lower cost to your company. Here’s how it works: Instead of you purchasing and maintaining your e-mail service in-house, which can be costly and time consuming, your Exchange server is hosted (and maintained) in a high-performance, high-security hosting company “in the cloud” where you can access it securely from any device or PC.

Best of all, you don’t have to make any changes in HOW you access your e-mail – your messages will simply be delivered to your inbox, phone, or other device faster and with fewer issues, and it will always be synchronized and up-to-date!

Here are just a few of the advantages:

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