At Abtrac our entire focus is on the security and safety of your data, how easy is it to use and how can we deliver more to you, for less. We keep our costs down using the latest in AI to facilitate development, marketing and the ongoing safety and reliability and integrity of your Abtrac business data.
As we’re starting a New Year and another trip around the sun, the current work ethos is very clear. We’re in a “let’s do more with less” global movement. It’s a political, social media, economic and technological driven change all around us. Online is undeniably the driver.
Consider how we now do our banking, pay our bills, check out the next purchase of anything, be it a house, a car or our groceries. We’re all doing more with less. Less travelling to the bank and less time walking around super market aisles. And houses or cars are sorted on line before the sales people hear from you. By the way, can you remember when was the last time you actually bought a newspaper?
We’re already seeing what this means in our everyday lives. What does it mean at work?
In the world of business, face to face “in person” is no longer the only way things are done. We do as much on Teams or Zoom.
A lot of uncertainties have grown over the last few years. But there’s one increasingly obvious factor. Regardless of your industry, your business needs to keep up with digital innovation. It’s an expectation of increasing numbers of your clients and of course it’s an expectation when dealing with others in your line of business. You can’t afford to be the last one holding out. Doing more of what we did yesterday no longer cuts it and won’t cut it going into the future. And I don’t mean 10 years from now. Think the next 12 months.
In businesses, you’ll recall it wasn’t so long ago that any piece of software required servers. Your first $20,000 was just getting the box to run everything on. Then there were people you were paying to install and maintain each individual package.
Here’s an interesting fact. Recent surveys show that controlling and managing IT spend is now more important than compliance, managing licensing and even internet security (from info.flexera.com survey showing SMEs report managing IT costs is more important than IT security). Personally, I think security should be number 1. It’s a no-brainer.
Current cost pressures and attracting and retaining staff with the expertise your business needs are all having a pull-down effect on businesses. To do more with less, taking into account the hybrid working phenomena and of course AI, businesses are using more and more cloud technology. The reason is it’s by far the most efficient way to deliver what people want. And in a tougher economy, the good news is that cloud technology offers “per user” licensing meaning you only pay for what you need. It gives businesses tools to do more for less, in less time, at less cost and with less complexity.
We’re talking Office 365, Teams, Zoom, your chosen accounting system and of course in this blog, Abtrac. And speaking of talking, businesses choosing cloud software now report a much more democratic approach in their software decisions. No longer is it just director or C level or IT people making the call. Thanks goodness! People who will use the software, like line managers and admin staff have the upper hand. Does it do what we need at the coal face? Is it web based? Does it have a mobile app? Questions like frequency of upgrades and future development paths come after the fact.
Cloud software is also cheaper. Per-person licensing enables you to switch on and switch off licensing at whim ensuring you’re not paying for more than you need. But when more licenses are required, they’re right there to switch on, on demand.
So the question is, when will it all end? The answer of course is not in our lifetime. So where do you want to be. My suggestion is you don’t want to be ahead of the curve, because you might find you’ve followed a fad that goes nowhere. Change for the sake of change is also not necessarily an improvement, putting the business through disruption and a learning curve it really doesn’t need to tackle. It’s OK for the newly appointed CEOs or other influencers to want to leave their mark, a bit like a dog when it roams into your yard (you know what it will do). But everything comes with a cost that sometimes has no real financial benefit. Disruption is so old-school!
On the other hand, you wait too long to see what happens at your peril.
AI is a great example of this. You might have heard the saying, “AI won’t take your job, but someone with comparable skills to yours, plus a knowledge of AI will.” Find out all you can about it. Put Chat GPT or an equivalent on your phone. Knock yourself out!
So what’s the bottom line?
When choosing software and moving forward on or not too far behind the curve, look for cloud software with a track record in innovation, delivering what your business needs. Look for compliance, security, fit for purpose, continual improvement, easy to contact, and killer support.
And if in doubt. Look again.
Go for someone hosting on a trusted cloud service with the most compliance and security on offer. Abtrac runs entirely on servers hosted by and secured by Microsoft. It enables me to sleep easy at night.
The enterprise value of your business depends on the decisions you make, be they to stay with what you have, or look around.
Either way, feel free to reach out to me for a chat or with any questions. I’ll be pleased to hear about your business.
I’ll be pleased to refer you to others using Abtrac, who will tell you how they have benefitted from Abtrac, successfully and profitably doing more with less. Less stress come month end. Less delay in getting invoices out. Less drag on the cash flow as invoices going out faster resulting in the money coming in faster. Less issues finding answers when stuck because Abtrac comes with free email and telephone support. Less start up issues as we do it all the time with minimum disruption to your day-to-day operations.
Let’s all do more with less and have a great 2025!