Why Portland Businesses Should Leverage Managed IT Services 

Business competition in Portland is extremely fierce. In order to stay ahead of the curve, you need to leverage every possible advantage that you can get your hands on. One of which is partnering with a managed IT services provider.

What is a managed IT services provider (MSP)?

An MSP is a company that offers outsourced IT services, such as help desk support, network monitoring and maintenance, cybersecurity, vulnerability scanning, cloud migration, IT consulting, and more — depending on their clients’ needs.

 

For a flat monthly fee, an MSP can act as your company’s IT department or supplement your existing IT team. 

What are the advantages of partnering with an MSP?

Businesses of all sizes can greatly benefit from using managed IT services.

Reduced downtime and other IT problems

It can be very costly whenever your employees or customers are unable to access your computer systems due to IT downtime or other tech issues. Such circumstances prevent you from manufacturing products, making sales, and servicing your customers. Small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) reported losses of up to $50,000 for every hour of downtime. 37% of surveyed SMBs said they lost clients and 17% have lost revenue because of downtime. Aside from the monetary implications, downtime and other IT issues also negatively impact employee productivity and morale, and company reputation. 

 

With managed IT services, downtime and other tech problems are handled right away and systems are restored quickly. In fact, an MSP prevents such issues from even happening or escalating by proactively managing IT systems with malware scans, patches, upgrades, and other measures. They also conduct round-the-clock networking monitoring so they can quickly spot and resolve potential issues before these cause major disruptions or downtime. 

Improved productivity

By partnering with an MSP, you can finally say goodbye to the many IT problems that have been hindering your employees from being productive. Your employees won’t have to wait for hours or days before someone can help them fix a tech issue since MSPs offer 24/7 IT support.

 

In addition, MSPs can take care of all the IT tasks that your employees are not trained to do, such as managing server backups, applying updates and patches, conducting malware scans, and more. This frees up your employees’ time, letting them focus on their core job responsibilities and increase their productivity.

Improved security and compliance

MSPs are equipped with up-to-date knowledge, experience, tools, and processes to keep your data and systems protected from cyberattacks. They constantly monitor your systems to look for any vulnerabilities, which they proactively fix to prevent any attacks. An MSP can also train your employees so they won’t fall for phishing scams and other types of social engineering attacks.

 

Moreover, MSPs follow industry standards for storing, transferring, and protecting data, helping you stay compliant with the cybersecurity practices imposed by regulatory agencies. Such stringent cybersecurity measures save you from suffering hefty penalties and reputation damage that result from a data breach and unfulfilled compliance regulations. 

Cost savings and predictable IT spending

With an MSP, you no longer have to worry about hiring, training, and retraining in-house IT experts since you can tap into the pool of talent and resources of your service provider. This translates to huge savings especially since the average salary of an IT specialist in Portland is $53,461 per year. This rate does not yet include benefits, such as paid leaves and health insurance.

 

In addition, an MSP can help you get the most out of your technology investments since they know which tools and solutions fit your business needs and budget. They also have established relationships with different tech vendors, allowing them to get discounts that they pass on to their clients.

 

Furthermore, managed IT services make IT costs predictable since you only need to pay a fixed monthly fee for the services you need. This is a huge advantage for SMBs since they don’t have to worry about sudden, unexpected IT expenses.

Conclusion

These are the many reasons why Portland businesses should leverage managed IT services. All of these lead to increased revenue and ROI for your business.