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IT: What To Know Before You Grow

Your business is growing?  Great.  That's always a good thing, right? It is- until you suddenly find that the work you've got on your plate has gone beyond your capacity to perform it. Even boom periods create challenges for upcoming companies.  You may suddenly find you need more people, more equipment, and more space to handle that welcome upward trend.  But apart from investing in laptops or workstations for new personnel, many companies don't factor in the need for new technology, until the point that they abruptly learn that they need it. The truth is that company can outgrow its tecnology infrastructure in the same way it outgrows its physical premises. What was “just right” for a five-person shop is unlikely to be adequate for fifty, let alone five hundred. While you may be able to get by with a too-small office for a while by having people work at ...

2023-02-16T16:02:00+00:00

Game-Changing Technologies: Here Comes The Next Wave

If you’ve been in the workplace for any considerable length of time, you’ve already seen how technological changes have had the power to rapidly and radically transform the way business is done. No matter your age, chances are a multitude of sweeping changes have already taken place in your lifetime. Some have been immediately and obviously significant and transformative – and others have taken place almost unnoticed. Think about it for a moment: Twenty years ago, fewer than a third of America’s small and medium-sized businesses had adopted email. Your “powerful” new desktop computer – if you had one - probably had eight megabytes of RAM and a 1-gigabyte hard drive. If you sent an email, you probably did it through a dialup connection to America Online or CompuServe. As primitive as these things sound now, they were ­game-changing technologies and they had enormous ramifications for business. If there’s anything ...

2023-02-16T16:02:01+00:00

Your Website Needs To Be Mobile Search Friendly- And So Does Your Intranet

Recently you or your webmaster may have received notice that your public website is not mobile friendly. Google is now beginning to rank search based on the “mobile friendliness” of pages – and the notification you received is Google’s way of warning that your site may not perform well in future search results if changes aren’t made. Smart webmasters, marketers, and site owners know that the world of search is continuously evolving, and they need to evolve along with it if they are to be competitive. But what about search abilities inside of your business? It’s a troubling fact that most business are lacking internal search capabilities when it comes to their documents, records and intellectual property. Today’s employees need rapid access to critical information, and effective search capabilities are vital. In addition, the leaders of the future will not be satisfied when working for companies that cannot provide internal information via ...

2023-02-16T16:02:01+00:00

This Is The End: Say Goodbye To Windows Server 2003 Extended Support

 It’s true: Microsoft will stop supporting Windows Server 2003 this coming July.   For a few years now, Microsoft has been saying goodbye to a generation of its most successful products, including Windows XP, Office 2003, and more. Microsoft is now getting ready to play The Doors’ epic goodbye song “The End” for their extremely successful Windows Server 2003 platform in just a few months.   For twelve years, Server 2003 has served companies well. More than a decade of regular updates and fixes have made it a solid, reliable platform for tens of millions of applications running on millions of servers worldwide.   This July, that comes to an end.   Microsoft pulled the plug on regular support in 2010, but many companies have bought time – or limped along – by depending on paid extended support. That’s all over soon.   Make no mistake: This is a big deal – an infinitely more ...

2023-02-16T16:02:01+00:00

Why Would You Choose Office 365 Over Google Apps?

You need technology that can be as flexible as your business is. Growing companies are constantly challenged to find technologies that help them to simplify without giving up control, work better together and be productive anywhere. And they want to get more value for their investments. Because your company is growing, you’ve got more to do. But chances are, you still have to do it all with less cost and limited resources. To grow, you’ve got to do more with less. If you’re like many small to midsize businesses, you’re using Google’s online productivity suite. But more and more companies are turning to Office 365 over Google Apps. Why would a small business choose Office 365 instead of Google? Microsoft has released a whitepaper that discusses ten reasons Office 365 is a better choice for your organization.  We’ve included a summary below Top 10 Reasons to Choose Office 365 1) Office ...

2023-02-16T16:02:01+00:00

An SMB Serving SMBs

Too many small and medium businesses find themselves forced into the IT business. They may be retail operations, manufacturers, lawyers or CPAs, but they still end up spending hours upon hours troubleshooting their networks, managing software licenses, updating operating systems and upgrading hardware. But it can be hard for an SMB to get out of the IT business: computer repair techs and local IT companies can offer some help, but the big names in enterprise-level hosting are really only set up to handle large corporate accounts, or technically savvy users who can answer all their own questions. There is no customer service number to call if you need help or run into a snag. An SMB Serving SMBs With Red Level Networks, SMBs get everything—virtualization, disaster recovery, managed services, cloud computing, Office 365 and more—along with a consultant and partner who actually answers the phone and has someone ready to help if ...

2023-02-16T16:02:01+00:00

A Cloud Service Provider That WANTS To Talk To You

We're all moving our data to the cloud—our music, our email, our family photos, the software that runs our lives. The cloud makes it easier to do more with less effort. But as anyone who has ever had a problem with their Gmail or iTunes accounts can attest, the clean-and-easy cloud future has one big, dirty secret: Big cloud service providers do not want to talk to you. Dave King, president of Red Level Networks, chuckles as he explains. "It's true. I don't even think they'll give you a 1-800 number. Companies like Google and Amazon, they're excellent hosts, but they honestly don't want to talk to you, as a customer. They'll give you all the resources you want, and it'll work if you can make it work on your own. But God forbid you have a question—and we all know that there are lots of questions." Dave King wanted to offer ...

2023-02-16T16:02:02+00:00

Eliminating Downtime For A Hands-On Property Management Company

Lockwood Management is a property management firm located in Michigan, specializing in family and senior housing. Over the last fourteen years Lockwood has grown from managing just six communities to employing 120 team members across 30 sites. Because of their customer-centered "hands on" style of property management, they place a high priority on communication, connectivity and collaboration among their many employees and sites. But their on-site IT systems struggled to keep pace with their growth. Any problems at the main office effectively crippled the entire network. Upgrading to a Remote Hosting Solution Dave King, president of Red Level Networks, has helped many businesses work through similar IT growing pains. "As their business grows they’re going to add employees. They usually aren't thinking about the impact that will have on their server and other equipment. Even just adding a few new users means adding more resources, more licenses, more performance." When a ...

2023-02-16T16:02:02+00:00

Network Security: Be Prepared And Prevent Disaster

Despite a series of high-profile security breaches in the news, most businesses still treat their network security as a low-priority. As Red Level Networks president Dave King explains, "Security is kind of like a car crash: You and I both drive thousands of miles each year. You can't recall every trip to the grocery store and the doctor's office and your kid's school. But if you're in one car crash, that makes a huge impression." All too often, it takes that huge impression for business owners to take action on security. Red Level Networks is working to change that. Thinking About Security Before the Catastrophe Seeing someone else's data disaster is a lot like passing a wrecked car on the highway: It can trigger a momentary change in your habits, but as soon as you're safely down the road, you quickly return to your old habits—some of which are unsafe. ...

2023-02-16T16:02:02+00:00

Red Level Named One Of Metro Detroit’s Best And Brightest Companies 2014

Red Level has been recognized as a Best and Brightest Company to Work For by the Michigan Business and Professional Association. This award honors companies with human resources approaches that are seen as thoughtful and innovative. Winners are required to demonstrate tangible organizational value and business results through their best practices in human resource management. “We are happy to be recognized for best HR practices, and proud to be counted among a number of peer companies that are also being honored,” Red Level CEO David King said on learning about the award. “Creating and maintaining a healthy workplace is key to our ability to attract and retain top talent and, as a result, offer exceptional value to our clients. It is just good business.” For the first time, the award this year includes companies with 50 or fewer employees, recognizing that entities of all sizes are building better business, richer lives, and ...

2023-02-16T16:02:02+00:00