It's March! Time to do some IT spring cleaning

So when was the last time you did some spring cleaning with your IT? In this post, we'll show you six ways you can save money and solve problems with a few easy activities.

In no particular order:

1. Check your software usage

You've three ways of going about this, depending on your IT department's or MSP's existing capabilities. If you have software license management tools available, then you can run a report to find all the licenses you're paying for but not using (although, if you have SLAM tools, you probably do this already). If not, then you can work to build a three-way comparison between your headcount, the number of installs for a given piece of software, and the number of licenses you're invoiced for by the supplier. Remember that finding too many installs is as valuable as finding too few if you want to avoid paying fines and making catch-up payments.

2. Shop around for your telecom services

If you're out of contract for your telephone lines and fiber broadband, it's time to get a few quotes. Telecom prices fall reliably and it's often the case that when you stick with one provider for a long period you'll end up paying over the odds.

3. Streamline your online storage

Different users have different preferences, like Dropbox over OneDrive or Google Drive. And remember that project you did with Company A when you had to buy some Box.com license so you could share data? Over time, you could find out that your business is paying over for a substantially similar service. And if you're a Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace company, and you're paying for Dropbox or Box, then you're certainly going to save some money by making a decision for the greater good.

4. More than a hundred users? Negotiate better discounts

With this many users, you really shouldn't be paying retail. One of the biggest savings you can make as you grow is to avoid, or to periodically reset, the price you're paying. Vendors will typically let you just add licenses and users, but without proactively giving you the discount you would legitimately receive if you were taking the larger number to them as a new customer.

5. Make IT a profit center

Lots of smaller organizations leave IT as a central overhead. But the problem quickly becomes that other departments start to run up IT costs because they know it won't hit their own departmental budgets (or bonus payments). This "IT is free" attitude will become very damaging over time.

• For everything you can allocate by user, like Microsoft licenses, endpoint protection software, etc., charge the cost to other departments in ratio to their headcount.
• For shared services like Internet bandwidth you can do the same, but you may need to weight the allocation (e.g. maybe your marketing department uses more bandwidth than others).
• Any capital costs related to purchasing computers or servers should be charged to a project budget under the ownership of either IT or another department, whoever the beneficiary of the project happens to be.
• Absolutely all losses, thefts, and damages to laptops and mobile devices should be charged to the responsible party. Give them an incentive to take care next time!

6. Get a competitive quote for your managed services contract

Been with your MSP for a few years? It may be time to get a fresh pair of eyes on your IT. Someone else will be eager for your business, and willing to offer more keen pricing. And how knows? If they're like us they'll also take care of the periodic housekeeping for you, too!