As businesses experience growth, their technology requirements also increase. To keep up with this need, many growing businesses contract IT managed services companies. The demand for managed service providers (MSP) has been evident in the past years. With the numerous benefits they provide, it’s not hard to determine why more and more companies are using outsourced IT service providers.
IT managed services companies supplement your existing IT staff and infrastructures. By collaborating with an MSP, a dedicated IT firm will handle your entire network, servers, computers and other technology needs. This is the perfect solution for businesses that aim to achieve a certain level of efficiency without having to worry about the resources.
Choosing the right IT managed services companies is important. Listed here are some of the things to consider when evaluating a managed services provider.
What to Look for in IT Managed Services Companies
1: Fast Service and Response Time
When choosing a managed services provider, you must ensure that they are always available to quickly respond to your issues. It is not enough for them to forward your calls and concerns to a call center. Instead, they must be there to respond in a timely manner. Getting a quick response time from your IT provider can help your business to operate efficiently, allowing you to gain more revenue.
2: Helps in IT Planning
A reliable IT managed services company will assist you in IT planning. Look for a provider that will give you advice and expertise when it comes to annual IT planning. They can save your business a significant amount of money and will improve your efficiency on technology, helping you to grow further. Make sure that your managed services provider is looking beyond their own interests.
3: Security Monitoring
Businesses generate and store huge amount of data every day. As such, it is essential to rule out the noise and determine what data is meaningful. This way, you can respond and protect against damaging security threats. A good managed IT service will provide security testing and monitoring for attacks, helping safeguard your network from cyber criminals and hackers.
4: Availability
Although you do not work 24 hours a day, your computer network is always running and so should your IT provider. When choosing any managed services, you must guarantee that your provider is available to serve you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, as your business depends on it.
5: Maintenance and Support
You must choose a vendor that offers local on-site maintenance and support. This is very important especially if your business is hit with emergencies such as a weather disaster, vandalism, or power outage. A good IT managed services will help you plan ahead, secure your data, and make sure your business can recover from a disruptive event by having a disaster recovery plan.
6: Third-party Vendor Partnerships
Another advantage that you can get from managed services is that they can take care of the technology vendors for you. This can save you time, as you don’t have to track down various vendors on your own for service and support. When evaluating a provider, look for companies they partner with and ensure they have expertise on the tools that you use.
7: Employee Support
If your staff are not familiar with the technology you use, they will have a hard time to get things done. Make sure that the IT managed services provider you get is always ready to provide solutions to technology questions and use remote access to resolve issues quickly.
8: Daily Backups and Cloud Services
Hiring IT managed services companies is a great way to keep your data safe and secure. Make sure your provider has a remote server that can automatically and consistently backup your data for safety purposes.
Swift Systems
Swift Systems is an Information Technology firm based in Maryland. We are staffed with an experienced team of IT professionals providing clients with high quality managed IT services.
For a reliable IT managed service provider, rely on Swift Systems. We have the extensive expertise that will help you solve your biggest IT challenges. Call us today to discuss your requirements!