Techsperts Talk

Are you just starting your business? Before you proceed, answer this question: who is your target audience? Your answer will affect nearly everything your business does, from its marketing strategy to its prices.

The funny thing is that a lot of first-time business owners don’t identify their target audience. They want to cast a wide net; they want their business to appeal to everyone. Unfortunately, the scattershot approach usually doesn’t work. Why not?

Small businesses often have small IT budgets—and that doesn’t have to be a problem. As we’ll see in this post, there are several options for small businesses to utilize great IT on a limited budget. Some of these are highlighted in current trends, including the use of mobile technology, cloud computing, and bring-your-own-device policies.

Facebook created Pages in 2009 with the idea of facilitating communication between businesses and their clients. That was five years ago.

In that short time, social media has moved from a fringe idea in the business world to what nearly amounts to a virtual must-have.

Wait a second, you’re probably thinking. Shouldn’t that headline read “The Pros and Cons of Expanding a Business”?

Nope, it’s not a typo. In this post, we are going to talk about the potential downsides of expanding a business.

IT emergencies happen, and usually at the worst possible times. When they come, are you prepared to deal with them? 

Can you prepare for something that is, by definition, unexpected and potentially catastrophic?

About 2.4 billion people in the world have access to the Internet, and about 70% of them log on to it each day. (That’s according to the 2009 CIA World Factbook; I’m guessing the numbers have gone up since then.) You probably use the Net multiple times per day, as I do, to check the weather in the morning, stay in contact with friends and business associates, shop, and the like.

Backup Basics

There’s an old saying in IT that goes something like this: “You never realize how important backups are until you need one and don’t have one.” Unfortunately, this is true even today. While consumers are more tech-savvy than ever, many computer users still neglect to create copies of their hard drives to protect their data from potentially permanent loss.

Another wave of ransomware scare has hit the Internet. Should you be concerned?

Yes.  The short answer is yes, anytime you hear news of another cyber threat, you should be concerned.  But not frantic.  Here’s why.

Why worry about someone looking over your shoulder when you can worry about someone stealing information from your browser?

Our Internet browsers are our windows to the world. We use them to check the weather, keep up on the news, bank, shop, and do all kinds of things. Unfortunately, from a security standpoint, a browser is more like a wide-open screen door than a locked window.

As more operations become computerized, the threat of cyber attacks become greater. Businesses are leveraging the efficiencies of ‘Bring Your Own Technology’ policies, but they come with inherent risks also. For more information on BYOT,