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Using The Tools At Hand
Don’t be anachronistic. You don’t really need paper anymore. Certainly, it’s good to have some on-hand, but a paper is going the way of the typewriter. So are on-site server arrays. With cloud computing, you can have all the computational processing, management, and storage capacity of an enterprise even though you’re just an SMB.
Imagine having half a dozen laptops between half a dozen team members and being able to contend with international corporations at a competitive level. Certainly, not all businesses are so situated, but depending on who you are and what you do, such a scenario isn’t totally without the bounds of possibility either.
Consider costs you can recoup through cloud computing. If you had an array of 20 servers, and each one only cost you $5k a year, total, over the course of five years, including maintenance and upgrade costs, that would be a $500k savings. Additionally, you can outsource space expenses through BYOD, or Bring Your Own Device.
You can even “rent out” end-user devices like smartphones and laptops through DaaS, or Device as a Service. You pay a monthly fee, and if a device malfunctions, you trade it out. All its data is stored on the cloud; the device is now just like a pair of 3-D glasses to view a “cloud computing cinema” if you will. No longer must you invest $5k+ per laptop. The laptops are essentially disposable, just like 3-D glasses.
Software Considerations
Beyond hardware simplification solutions available owing to modern innovation, in terms of software you’ve got some surprising solutions as well. Certainly, cloud computing has facilitated design apps which are additionally cost-effective, but you can also use the cloud to design and host your own applications, and even monitor them contemporaneously.
For example, if you use Python to develop something, you’ll want to use software like AppOptics which provide powerful insights for Python performance; according to the site, you can gain: “…real-time visibility into any application…” You can develop and monitor the app through the cloud, providing you greater operational security at a reduced cost.
The best way to be productive and grow your business is to maximize every expense. One of the best places to cut costs now is in terms of technology. Where before, a dollar may have been divvied up such that 50 cents were tech related, thirty cents were production staff and infrastructure, and twenty cents went to marketing, now you might be able to cut that tech spending down to ten cents on the dollar.
Essentially, you’re buying turnkey tech services which come at a monthly fee and include greater professionalism. This gives your business greater scalability, autonomy, flexibility, and room for error. You’ve got to have room for error if you’re going to succeed. When your margins are too close, a simple mistake can totally undermine you; and this is surely intolerable.
Diversifying Your Profit Portfolio
Another tactic to facilitate profitability, growth, and flexibility will include diversification. Don’t just sell the primary products and services of your enterprise. You must branch out. Movie theaters sell movies, popcorn, soda, candy, and now they’ve branched into full-on meals as well as alcohol. Even though ticket costs are higher than ever, movie theaters are still making a profit because they were savvy enough to diversify.
If, for example, your business involves graphic design, you may want to branch out into written or film content production. You may additionally want to provide consultation services. You could also work as a networking agent between businesses, and conduct trades for services rendered.
That is to say: if you provide ads for a business throughout the month, you may be able to get them to pay you in free services, netting a tax deduction for both of you in the process. The point is, you want to find creative ways to increase the revenue streams which support your enterprise, however large or small it is.
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Combining Tactics For Greatest Success
A third way to increase profitability and growth involves technology which combines both branching out and cutting-edge solutions into something comprehensively advantageous. IoT, or the Internet of Things, can provide ubiquitous real-time operational data. You can use that information for more than just internal needs.
So consider your existing operations, and determine where you can maximize expenses through innovations in the market and re-structuring of operational models, as well as branching out. Last but not least, remember that you must continually increase profit and diversify yourself to remain effective in the long-term.
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