Small Business Computer Consulting

Attorney General of California Bill Lockyer announced on Friday that he cannot tie computer business Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd to any crime.  The computer company has been under investigation for activities in 2005 that suggested the company was using illegal means to determine the source of security leaks to the media.

Lockyer stated that the investigation would look at those at the top of the computer business’ corporate chain.  However, Lockyer reported to sources that he has no evidence yet that the CEO of HP is in any way attached to the crimes.   

Hurd has been closely watched since reports were published earlier in the week suggesting he was involved more in HP’s probe than was initially suspected.  Major news sources announced that Hurd was the one to approve the sting operation to rat out a reporter that released security information about the company.  

If Hurd is involved in the scheme, he may follow the lead of computer business’ HP executive Patricia Dunn who will resign in January because of her involvement.  Hurd was set to discuss the issue late Friday.  The company continues to insist that it used outside investigators.  These outside investigators used false identities in order to get phone records from employees, board directors and journalists involved with HP.

Lockyer says that his office is still in the midst of the investigation of the computer business, but that the conclusion will come hopefully in weeks or even days.  

Blogged By:  Joshua Feinberg

Business billing and collection can be an area where new network consultants get themselves in trouble.  To ensure you get paid, you have to start very early setting up good practices for business billing and collection.  

Here are some basic issues you need to understand when setting up your business billing and collection policy.

The most important issue in new network consultants’ minds regarding business billing and collection is, "What software package should I use for time and billing?"

If you’re just focusing on that, you’re missing the bigger issues related to business billing and collection.  Of course you should use a piece of software that makes it a little easier to carry out business billing and collection, but the software is not going to fix any underlying problems you have with actually getting paid.

Business Billing and Collection Premises
First, you need to know that steady clients perceive your company as an insurance policy. What does this have to do with business billing and collection?  Everything. This insurance policy mentality is what motivates clients to pay your company on time.  They fear that if they forget to pay invoices on time, you will not help them (cover them) in the case of a network emergency.  If you bill them regularly, steady clients will pay.

On the flip side are the one-shot deal, cherry picking customers.  These people view your company and services as a commodity.  Here you need excellent and very tight business billing and collection practices if you hope to get paid.

The cherry picking clients don’t value your relationship. They view you as one of hundreds who offer the same service.  There’s no fear motivating them and they have an entirely different mind set. They have no qualms whatsoever about paying you late or not paying you at all.

They’re not interested in building a relationship with your company. They’re just after what they perceive to be the absolute, rock-bottom, lowest price. If they get a late notice from you, they’ll probably laugh at it and throw it out or put it through the shredder.

Bottom Line on Business Billing and Collection
It’s very important from a business billing and collection standpoint that you understand your steady clients come from an entirely different place than one-shot deal clients.  Knowing and understanding this difference will make an enormous difference on your business billing and collection practices.  Think about how you will handle these two distinct situations when you are developing your business billing and collection policy.

In this article, you’ve been introduced to Business Billing and Collection. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge about Business Billing and Collection, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business.

Computer gurus are a necessary fixture for a successful client relationship. Your initial reaction may be that having an on-site computer guru will take money out of your pocket.  In fact, the computer guru’s presence will help to increase your profits in the long run.  

When the computers and servers work well and do what they are supposed to, everyone is happy.  Whether the computer guru fixed the problem or it was large enough that you needed to be called in, the perception is the same:  having your services benefits the company.  

So why do these sweet spot businesses need a computer guru in the first place?  They face a unique IT dilemma. These offices are often too small to justify on-site IT headcount, but yet are large enough to have major computer support headaches.

Even without an on-site IT group, in addition to a “real” job someone takes on the role of internal computer guru.  This is the person everybody instinctively yells for when the laser printer jams, the database locks up, or toolbars and files disappear.

The internal computer guru, often an office manager or administrator, gets stuck with the company’s PC problems.  They often have had no formal training and this is where your services come in.  By offering a few hours of highly focused training, you can often do wonders to transform the internal computer guru into a highly effective, on-site systems administrator.

The client enjoys a more immediate response to IT problems at the site and, when executed properly, this training will turn the internal computer guru into a fabulous ally that becomes an extension of your overall computer support solution.

Bottom Line on Computer Gurus
Computer gurus are your friends.  They are not competition and they will not cause you to lose revenue.  What the computer guru will do is make you look good.  The more support and training you can give the clients’ computer gurus, the better.

In this article, you’ve been introduced to Computer Gurus. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge about Computer Gurus, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business.

Profitability is what will determine whether your business succeeds or fails.  There are many ways to manage and track your profitability.  Here are 6 great tips we have gathered that help us maximize our profitability.

• Don’t resell products.  Don’t get involved with reselling products unless you have a decent profit margin; generally in the neighborhood of 25 to 35 percent.  Any less, and the time and money spent managing the retail system will cut into your profitability significantly.

• Bill clients for all of your time.  You are running a business, not charity.  If you do choose to write off a few hours, record them on the invoice but credit the client back.  Use a line item reversal and indicate why you’re crediting it back as courtesy hours. Don’t do this too often though, or your profitability will suffer.

• Never turn down an agent or referral fee unless it’s a real conflict of interest.  All these passive income trickles can really add up at the end of the year and contribute to your overall profitability.  

• Be relentless about slashing expenses.  Just about everything you spend your time or money on should make you more productive and more profitable.  If your expenses aren’t making you more productive or improving your revenue and profitability, consider whether you really need them or not.  

• If you’re going to be using credit cards for your business, and you probably will be, get ones with low interest rates.  If you’re going to be carrying any business-related debt, try to get cards that have some kind of bonus attached to them.  

• Switch between a money market account and your non-interest-bearing checking accounts.  As your business grows and you start carrying more substantial account balances during the year, float your funds back and forth between interest-bearing investments.  A couple thousand dollars a year in interest income can go a long way toward paying for some of your overhead items and improving profitability.  

Bottom Line on Profitability
A profitable business is a sustainable business.  Look at all of your business processes in terms of profitability and determine what you need to do more of and what you need to cut out completely.  Always be on the lookout for ways and means to improve your bottom line.

In this article, you’ve been introduced to Profitability. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge about Profitability, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business.

IT audits are a must-do in your network consulting business.  If you don’t make IT audits part of your paid services, clients will have you spend your precious time analyzing their system for free.  

Typically a client will want you to tell them up front, specifically what you plan to do for them before you get their business.  In other words, before any money has changed hands, you’ll have had to learn about their unique IT environment.  

This is what an IT audit is meant to do.  Rather than give it away for free you need to learn how to get clients to pay for it.  The sorts of tasks included in an IT audit include:

• writing proposals
• site survey work
• taking inventory
• analyzing existing configurations
• looking for inconsistencies
• identifying major security gaps
• looking for potential land mines and configuration mistakes
• prioritizing what needs to be done first, second, third. etc…  

The easiest way to sell IT audits is to come to the relationship with a position of power. This means having prospects contact you rather than you soliciting them.  It’s hard to sell a client on an IT audit if you sent them a direct mail postcard asking for their business.  

You need to keep this in mind as you move your business forward.  If you want to get paid for the time you spend doing an IT audit, then you need to focus on referrals and networking.  Getting your name known and having clients recommend your services makes it much easier for you tell a client that they must pay you for the IT audit part of the process.

The Bottom Line on IT Audits
IT audits are time consuming.  You don’t want to have to give them away as part of your client solicitation process.  The best way to avoid having to give away free IT audits is to concentrate on getting great word-of-mouth referrals.  When potential clients come to you, it is much easier to tell them that a paid audit is the first step.  Once you know what they want and need then you can proceed.  

In this article, you’ve been introduced to IT audits. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge of IT audits, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business. 

Pricing strategies for computer system installations are typically based on a price-fixed model.  This type of pricing strategy works well because the scope of the project is usually very well defined. This is not to say that you set a fixed price and then stick to it regardless. A smart pricing strategy means always building-in ways to protect yourself and minimize your risk.  

Protecting Yourself With A Fixed Pricing Strategy

• If you do choose to use a price-fixed pricing strategy for installations, the simplest and  easiest way to protect yourself is with a "provision for change" order.  Typically installations are done a week or two after your initial contact and sometimes an install takes weeks to finish.  Lots can change in that amount of time.  Make sure your pricing strategy can accommodate these changes.  If it doesn’t, you’ll end up the loser.

• Fixed pricing strategies for installation also require you to take a detailed site survey before you get started.  You generally want to put together a really tight proposal listing what is and what is not included in the price-fixed installation.  

• Do not do upgrades with a fixed pricing strategy.  You are taking responsibility for a lot of configuration garbage that you may have no idea what you’re walking into because you didn’t put it in there in the first place.  

• Another area to stay away from with a fixed pricing strategy is migrations.  

• An obvious time to not use a fixed pricing strategy is with odd-ball configurations.  They are, by definition, odd and this means you never know what you may getting yourself into.

Bottom Line on Pricing Strategy
Regardless of whether you are looking at an obvious odd ball configuration or some other installation issue, if you are considering a fixed pricing strategy you need to develop a sense for detecting potential troublesome areas.  You have to develop an instinct, over time, for recognizing issues that go outside of industry standards.  Aside from that, making sure you have a provision for change order in place should help you protect yourself when using a fixed pricing strategy.

In this article, you’ve been introduced to Pricing Strategy. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge about Pricing Strategy, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business.

IT consulting services are offered at different levels and types in almost all the virtual IT businesses you encounter.  Deciding which IT consulting services you should offer is a key consideration when starting your business.

The IT consulting services you choose to offer should be driven by three main factors:   

1. What your prospects want
2. What’s out there in the marketplace
3. What your competitors are offering

IT Consulting Services Your Prospects Want
Who better than the people who will use your services to tell you what IT consulting services they want?  Start talking to people that you identify as fitting your sweet spot profile.  Ask them questions about their current computer situation:

• What do they use their computers for?
• What’s working well?
• What’s not working?
• What could they use some help with?

That’s how you’re going to figure out what they really need and what types of IT consulting services you should be offering.

IT Consulting Services in the Marketplace
Another way to figure out what kind of products and IT consulting services to offer is to read two key trade publications for small business computer consultants:

• Computer Reseller News (CRN)
• VAR Business

These two publications will keep you up to date with just about everything that you need to know about what’s hot in terms of products and services.  Let these publications be your filtering device.  Because their focus is on the business of IT, they will identify the products that are cool and that also have great potential for you to build value-added IT consulting services into your virtual IT business.  

IT Consulting Services Competitors are Offering
The final way to figure out what products and IT consulting services to offer is to conduct  competitive intelligence.  Basically, you spy on your local market.  

• Visit web sites
• Look at your Chamber of Commerce Web sites
• Visit links for anyone providing similar kinds of services
• Google any type of IT consulting services for your city, county, province, state, zip code, postal code, area code, etc…

Once you know the IT consulting services that competitors are offering, analyze those services to decide the types of IT consulting services you want to offer, ones you don’t want to offer, and ways to improve upon what is currently offered.

Bottom Line on IT Consulting Services
Figuring out which IT consulting services to offer can be daunting.  Looking at what competitors offer and what is available in the marketplace should lead you in the right direction.  The best way to decide which IT consulting services to offer though, is to ask your prospects directly.  This way you know you have a market for whatever you decide to offer.

In this article, you’ve been introduced to IT Consulting Services. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge about IT Consulting Services, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business. 

Fixed price contracts are the best and safest method when working with a customer for the first time. This puts the customer as ease and it reduces your risk of not being paid at all.  With this first fixed price contract your main objective is to establish the willingness and ability to pay.  After that you can build the relationship.

It’s important to note that when you establish a fixed price contract you do that with a customer – not a client.  Until a customer has proven that they’ll be with you through the duration they are a transaction related customer. They are not a long-term client yet.  When you first start out with somebody if you set up a price fixed contract the customer will be a lot more receptive because they perceive lower risk.

This perception may mean a lower margin for you because your fixed price contract is less per hour than you normally charge. Don’t worry about this.  The more important objective here is to turn this customer into a client after you have established the willingness and ability to pay.

Fixed Price Contract Conditions
Doing price fixed contract work is only viable if you have very a defined project. It is very difficult to do with an emergency service call. You don’t know what you’re walking into. Keep that in mind. Don’t do foolish things like committing yourself to spend three days on a server rebuild for a fixed price contract of $250.

Include in every fixed price contract two or three sentences that explain that it is subject to credit approval.  If you grant credit, always leave yourself an out if they refuse to give you a credit application or the credit application is incomplete. This first fixed price contract is the riskiest.  Because of this you want to do things that are in your own best interests. 

The Bottom Line on Fixed Price Contracts
The key thing to remember with fixed price contracts is that you are more likely to get stuck with the first bill with a new customer than anywhere else. Use fixed price contracts as way to entice new customers and to lower your risk of nonpayment.  Your goal is to turn these fixed price contract customers into long term clients but first you need to know how willing and able they are to pay their bills.

In this article, you’ve been introduced to fixed price contracts. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge about fixed price contracts, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business.

Time and billing issues can cause the single fastest way to put yourself out of business overnight or put yourself in the position of financial strain.  Many people neglect to manage their time and billing properly and they pay for it in the end.  

Time and billing entails payment tracking and invoicing.  If you do it right you will get paid well and get paid fast.   If you do it wrong, well, you might not get paid at all.  Each of the following common time and billing methods have pros and cons as follows:

Time and Billing Through Automatic Credit
With this method of time and billing you grant everyone a certain amount of credit. You’re at relatively low risk, what’s the most you’ll lose, $250?  You attract clients with this method.  However, if you don’t say what the terms are, most people are going to assume it is net 30. If you are not firm and assertive with this time and billing practice those 30 days quickly turn into 60 days and more.  If you extend credit to everybody, odds are you will lose sooner or later.  That is not a good thing at all. Despite its marketability this is not a recommended method.

Time and Billing With Minimum Deposits
The second time and billing practice is to require a deposit before starting a project.  Typically the deposit ranges from 25% – 50%.  If you are really aggressive it’s 100%.  Collecting the deposit is often the easy part though.  With this time and billing method how do you know when the project is complete?  For this time and billing method to work you need to make sure the end point is very clearly defined.  You also need to have the luxury of time between engagement and work.  What if the deposit check bounces after you’ve started, and perhaps finished, the work?

Time and Billing Using a Merchant Account
This is a preferred time and billing method.  The first project is done on a credit card authorization before you even start. A signed proposal or quote is faxed back to you with credit card information.   You pay a small fee, 2 ½ to 3% to the credit card vendor, but at least you don’t have to beg for payment.  You don’t have to take the risk of not getting paid.  You don’t have to go through the hassle of checking credit references and taking credit applications for a one-shot deal.  The credit card charge can be disputed but this does not typically happen if the work is completed satisfactorily.  

The Bottom Line on Time and Billing
Every method of time and billing has its pros and cons.  What has proven to work best in the computer consulting industry is to use merchant accounts.  This does not mean that time and billing using credit or deposits is wrong, it simply means that the least risky method is the use of credit cards.  

In this article, you’ve been introduced to time and billing. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge about time and billing, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business. 

Business income is determined by business inputs. This having been said, so many beginning computer consultants want to know what they will make in the first year.  They try to base their business decisions on what they think an average business income will be.   

We can’t tell you how much you’re going to make. Your business income is dependent on so many variables that it is impossible for us to predict.  What we can tell you are the variables that are within your control.  Ask yourself the following questions and then analyze your self and your performance.  With your answers you can make plans to maximize your business income.

• What is your schooling and work experience/knowledge?  Credentials can help win clients and increase business income.    
• How selective are you when accepting clients?  If you take on anyone, you will inevitably end up working with people that are difficult and whose problems make your life miserable.  The business income generated ends up being more trouble than it is worth.
• What is your personality or temperament like?  Do you get stressed and frustrated easily?  What is your demeanor when dealing with clients?  You need to be calm and professional at all times.
• How much time do you spend making sales calls?  Even if you hate doing it, this is a necessary activity for earning business income.
• How well do you handle follow-up?  The sales call or initial contact is just the start of a potential relationship.  You will lose much business income if you fail to follow-up on your leads.
• How aggressive are you with your marketing activities?  The more diverse your marketing strategies, the greater your reach.  
• How good are your business partnerships with other advisers?  Often overlooked, this is critical for maximizing your business income; not only from a networking perspective but from the knowledge and wisdom you will gain.  

The Bottom Line on Business Income
Your business income is almost entirely in your hands. There are no average numbers because there are no average business owners.  What you put into your business will be the deciding factor in how much business income you will generate.  Look at each of your business decisions with business income in mind and then formulate a plan to make the most of the resources available to you.

In this article, you’ve been introduced to business income. To learn more about how you can improve your knowledge of business income, just click here now to get access to a free one-hour audio training program on 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Computer Consulting Business.