Who doesn’t want to improve their cash flow? We all do. Cash flow is one of the centerpieces of your business. Positive cash flow means you are effectively utilizing your liquid assets successfully to grow your business. But having a positive cash flow isn’t always the way. You will bump into having a negative cash flow if you don’t limit your cash outflow. This means you have to manage your expenses more efficiently as your sales to keep your business on the right path.
So, any business who wants to improve their cash flow should take a good look at their IT environment. From direct expenses, like the cost of equipment and services, to the indirect costs like power and productivity, your IT plays a huge role in your financial picture.
When you take a closer look at your IT strategy and spending habits, you can unlock a bevy of potential savings. Here are 7 ways your IT strategy can improve your cash flow:
- Consider how you’re paying for things. Some companies opt for long-term financing, using capital to purchase the backend equipment like servers and individual user PCs. Others use options like “hardware as a service”, allowing them to lease needed equipment, and pay it as an operating expense.
- Bundle services when possible. For example, some of our customers get a great price on their managed IT services and their hardware by bundling it into one fixed monthly bill. This makes their cash flow a little more predictable.
- Lower your power bill. How much are you paying in electricity costs to power up all your equipment? If you have older equipment, you can be sure that you’re paying much more in energy costs than you need to. Newer equipment runs more efficiently and doesn’t take as much energy to keep cool.
- Reduce your equipment. Newer physical server boxes are capable of holding more virtual servers than their older counterparts were. Upgrading your server boxes allows you to get rid of a lot of equipment and move your 15 servers into one or two boxes, saving power and space.
- Get in the cloud. For many businesses, the cloud offers a lower-cost option to securely manage your IT network without paying the power bills or managing a lot of equipment. Cloud also allows you to scale your IT, so you can add or remove users as needed.
- Look for new technology. There is a lot of technology out there that could save you a lot of money. For example, software that manages your finances more effectively, or firewall software that gets so granular it can tell you which of your employees are spending six hours a day on Facebook.
- Minimize downtime. Industry analysts at Ponemon Institute have estimated the cost of downtime at $7,900 per minute. Your actual cost may vary, but once you add up associated costs like lost revenue and stalled productivity, it has negatively impacted your cash flow. Work with an IT partner who thinks about how long it takes you to recover and can maximize your uptime.
These strategies can positively impact your cash flow on their own. Combined, they create a powerful way to free up cash, create a more predictable budget, and reduce debt. Consult with an IT professional to get more insight into ways your own IT strategy can improve your company’s cash flow and start reaping the savings!
Find out how you can free up cash flow with your IT strategy.