From smartphones and tablets to server farms and VoIP phone systems, technology permeates businesses these days. All of that advanced technology for business creates opportunities for smoother transactions, more efficient and affordable operations, and streamlined training. It’s even opened the door for entirely new career fields and business models. So, which advanced technologies should you focus on for your business?

Security

If your business deals with sensitive information or physical products, which is almost every business these days, then it’s important to remain protected with security both from a technology and physical perspective. In terms of your business property’s physical security, a POE security camera system keeps your property protected and monitored with the best in technology. POE security systems use NVR recorders which have a better video quality and have many other benefits over traditional DVR recorders. Additionally, make sure to invest in technology security systems to protect your business and client data.

Training

Historically, training has been a time-intensive, resource-intensive process. Someone must take time away from doing productive, profitable work to bring someone up to speed on basic processes. These days, you can employ animation education videos to cover a lot of that basics. Employees can enjoy animated videos and take online tests to prove they have absorbed the information. Furthermore, the videos can serve as a refresher for everyone else on key processes or company information.

Cloud Computing

Let’s take a look at disaster recovery as the case in point. Let’s say fire tears through your physical store and takes out your on-site servers. Those servers probably contained your most valuable resources: customer data and orders. Without that information, you’ll struggle to reopen. Cloud-based disaster recovery basically creates a mirror image of your servers with all that info and licensed software. Instead of putting it back together piecemeal, you just download everything onto new servers. A great example of a service that does is Amazon Redshift. You may be thinking to yourself, What is Amazon Redshift? Simplified, Amazon Redshift is a relational database that stores a collection of data with predefined relationships between them.

• Data storage/backups

• Email archiving

• Software hosting

• Big data analytics

• Disaster recovery

• Limit in-house IT infrastructure needs

Let’s take a look at disaster recovery as the case in point. Let’s say fire tears through your physical store and takes out your on-site servers. Those servers probably contained your most valuable resources: customer data and orders. Without that information, you’ll struggle to reopen. Cloud-based disaster recovery basically creates a mirror image of your servers with all that info and licensed software. Instead of putting it back together piecemeal, you just download everything onto new servers.

Marketing Automation

A lot of marketing requires imagination and insight. It also requires a number of repetitive tasks that can dull the mind and make people quit. Sending out email newsletters is one example. Posting on social media is another example. Marketing automation software takes a lot of that low-level task-work out of the equation. Your marketing people build content and campaigns, but the software handles the mind-numbing delivery and posting tasks.

Using advanced technology for business isn’t just about playing with shiny new toys. It’s about leveraging technical resources in ways that free up human resources and help secure your long-term prospects. Advanced technology can improve your security system and streamline marketing. It can systematize basic training without soaking up human capital. It can even help ensure you reopen after a disaster. Heck, advanced technology can even free you from needing a dense, in-house IT infrastructure. It’s a path to running a better business.