Providing Service and Support for small business
A limited clientele guarantees devoted attention to your needs
For all IT Service and Support: Adelaide and Canberra
Providing Service and Support for small business
A limited clientele guarantees devoted attention to your needs
For all IT Service and Support: Adelaide and Canberra
The following is a (not limited to) list of services offered by Antares IT and conducted under our Terms and Conditions which can be made available on request. Click on Read More for more details on the service or here to go to the Service Details section.
Described as ""the process of studying a procedure or business in order to identify its goals and purposes and create systems and procedures that will achieve them in an efficient way".
At this stage we analyse your business to determine the needs, processes, and roles and responsibilities that define your business. This gives you a base to allow us and you to determine what IT systems you need and allow a bespoke solution to be developed.
With process and strategic/business needs you have in place; your IT may be falling short. We can look at what you have, what you need and propose a solution for you to allow your business to run more smoothly and deliver what you want from your IT.
Once the needs have been determined,solution that suits your business can be designed. This means all components of your IT solution support your business needs.
Hardware and software provisioning and the decision process associated with it is critical for a business. Not only is it important for them to be purchased at a reasonable price, they must be supported for the life of the product, satisfy the needs they were purchased for and their use be understood by the staff (and documentation be available to show the processes necessary)
Laptops, tablets and Mobiles. These are the core of the business and what needs to be purchased is determined by the needs the tasks performed and the roles of the users. For example, someone out in the field needs a light laptop with good Wi-Fi and storage for when offline. Someone in a home-office will need a larger screen, and a larger storage and more powerful processor. POS tablets need to be portable and secured against theft. Tablets and Mobiles need all that a laptop need.
Networks. The router is the start. Are there dark spots? Can a device move around the business and outside to outdoor seating? Can all devices access? Is it secure? Sometimes simple and sometimes complex, one size never fits all.
Ecommerce - Website and POS/EFTPOST Configuration. A core component of a functional business is the electronic payment for good s and services. How this is done is vast and complex these days.
Bespoke software development. While we can do this, it is important to understand that Commercial Off-the-shelf (COTS) is always the best alternative for any organisation, big or small. This is because long term support is guaranteed from large software providers and they are more likely to be tested with new operating system update/upgrades.
That being said, we can develop bespoke software in multiple operating systems.
Office365 Suite. Using common templates to author Word Templates, Excel spreadsheets and Access databases.
Accounting software. MYOB right? Well it's not that simple. Other software might offer you the functionality you need and might be the software of choice of your bookkeeper and/or accountant. We analyse your needs, recommend and can also work with your accountant/bookkeeper to develop the software you your needs. We can even develop Excel or Access if that's all you really need.
We can deliver all facets of your online presence, from the provisioning of the domain name, setup of a web and email hosting provider, design and authoring of the website.
We can also integrate this process into the Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Social Media Presence process to ensure that the website appears high in the search results, and that the website is integrated into the Google/Bing business locations and other social media providers.
Whether it is simply creating a top-level domains (TLD), the .com domain, or country code top-level domain (ccTLD), of which the .au domain is one we understand the separate and individual requirements for each and we are very familiar with the processes involved and the pitfalls that need to be mitigated.
We also recommend ownership of similar domains to avoid phishing and other malignant actions. For example, when you get example.com.au then also try to get example.com or even examples.com and redirect them to your site. Re can redirect these sites to you so your customers won't notice it at all.
We can provide provisioning, implementation and support of web and email hosting for your business. Once we determine your needs, we can recommend solutions.
Whether the site is a simple single page with contact us or more complex sites with customer logins and even checkout and payment functionality, we can do it. We are comfortable designing bespoke sites from the ground up or using content management system (CMS) such as WordPress and Wix.
Sometimes you need to migrate the domain or web and email hosting to another provider. This might happen because you want a better deal or are unsatisfied with the current provider or it may be that you have purchased a business with:"
One of the tasks we perform a lot is the replacement HDD and SSD of laptops and computers where the drive has failed. Having to explain to people that they have lost forever precious photos, documents and other important files is heartbreaking. That's why we recommend configuring a good cloud regime in their business to ensure files are backed up, versioning is activated s you can revert to previously saved documents and that sharing between colleagues is part of your processes.
Sometimes for security reasons, a NAS is good enough and recommended for a business. This gives you the functionality of a cloud service but is more configurable for user and security reasons. It's not always as good as a cloud service because you take ownership of the security, backup and configuration but if it's what you want, we can recommend the best solution for you and offer support, if necessary.
The Office365 provides integrated business support software in the Office suite, provides collaboration software in OneNote, SharePoint, Skype for Business, Teams among others.
For most small businesses, Office365 provides an effective software suite that we are experienced and capable of integrating into your business. We won't recommend solutions you won't use and will justify the needs.
Once you have your website, SEO will ensure that it is seen by potential clients when searching for businesses such as yours. A Social Media Presence will then allow your business to be seen and known in social media such a Facebook allowing you to talk to clients.
Google and Bing, that's it. Setup a Google my Business and a Bing Places for Business site and you're done. Easy. Well….not quite. It can be that easy but a lot of things can influence how successful you are here and depending on whether this is a new business, what was at your location before, whether you are taking over an existing business with very bad reviews or if you have a business with no shop front, this can get very complex quickly.
Also, how you setup google will influence whether your website is at the top of page one or the bottom of page two. Doing this involves setting up google right but it can also fall apart of the website and social media is not setup correctly.
Okay, TripAdvisor, Yelp and Facebook. Done.
Again, not always that easy. It can be but it can also be a pain but we've dealt with these sort of sites before and we've done all the nail biting, failure and then discovery before so you don't have to.
Again, there are other social media sites that maybe should be setup and others that maybe should not. All have an effect on how effective your social media profile (and SEO) are.
Security protection covers both malicious and accidental protection.
Risk Management is not about total prevention, it is about risk mitigation. Having a secure system is pointless if no one can use it. Security is a balance between security and usability, and between security and the cost to business.
See https://www.infoworld.com/article/2927458/find-the-right-balance-between-security-and-usability.html
The only thing you have to worry about is malicious hackers from -INSERT COUNTRY-. Wrong. Any one of your employees can make a mistake and cost you big. You can. Anyone could. For this reason, an effective and simple backup and disaster recovery regime is essential. Ideally, one where you don't have to worry about it till you (hopefully not) need it.
Backup should cover:
Even when backed up a disaster recovery plan is essential to ensure a business can get back up to speed in the shortest possible time with little to no loss of data.
I guess you can class this as protection of hardware and networks.
So, you have internet security so from now on it'll be smooth sailing. Anti-virus/malware/spam is not the same as internet security. This covers a vast array of malicious actions from people whose only intent is to exploit your business for monetary gain (and more importantly) with no benefit for your business.
Email. Email attacks can be very blatant and are usually detected by your email provider and added to your spam folders. We can then determine if there are any false positives (real valid business emails) and separate the two. All are done with consultation with you as you know the business, not you.
Website. Website attacks need access to your hosting provider or access to your domain.
User access and Roles. Defining who can access what system and what they can do can be a difficult balance between what a business needs to do and protecting your business. A system that is too restrictive can reduce the effectiveness of staff but a system that is too relaxed can open you up to abuse.
Password Protection. Making sure that all accesses to the business software and hardware is user managed and have strong, unique passwords but provide secure and effective password management so that forgotten passwords are recoverable is a balance between security and the effective running of the business.
We can provide this assistance and guidance to find the best balance for your business.
We are happy to provide IT consultancy advice on the full range of IT services that small business require to be a professional and effective deliverer of products and services. As an expert on the main deliverable of your business you don't need to be an expert on the things outside of the scope of what you do best. That's where we come in.
We have the knowledge of the things you need but that you don't need to know about because we've done it for other businesses and know the processes involved. That way, when you say you need service x, we can look up our processes, tailor it to your needs. If there are any problems, odds are we've faced them before.
When we've delivered what you need, we don't need to be around looking over your shoulder forever. We can give you training on how you maintain what we've delivered for you.
Once an IT solution has be developed, who maintains it? Who ensures your devices are up to date with the latest software and security patches. Who monitors the incoming email for spam and viruses? Who monitors the reviews coming to the social media sites and ensures all the information is up to date? Who answers your IT questions and actions the annoying hardware and software issues that occur?
This is where managed services come in. Our services can be adhoc or ongoing, providing you with both flexibility and peace of mind.
Sometimes the solution to your problem can be fixed quickly but getting to your location may take some time. Fortunately, we can offer remote support where we access your device while you are watching (you need to give us access every time we do this).
We can monitor your email accounts and remove obvious spam, so it doesn't clog up your mailboxes. With an understanding of your business, we can add an additional layer of protection and detect malicious or just plain annoying emails, so you don't have to.
Once we have provisioned your SEO and Social Media, we can monitor it to ensure it remains relevant and visible to your customers.
