The boss is glaring at you, the controller, and says, “Cut the IT budget for next year or we’re out of business!” “How in the world am I going to cut IT costs and worse, tell the boss he needs new servers?” you say under your breath.

Don’t despair. There IS a way to reduce your IT budget AND avoid the costly server upgrade. It’s called “Hosting”, a variation of Cloud computing. Hosting is where you put your construction software and data offsite on another company’s servers and access it from anywhere you have an internet connection. Moving your software and data to the Cloud by hosting is like using other people’s money, only it’s other people’s servers.

With hosting, you get the benefits of new servers without the big investment and ongoing costs of server maintenance. You don’t change software. There is no costly conversion. There is nothing new to learn.

Benefits of Cloud Computing

• Reduced investment – Someone else buys the servers
• Reduced IT costs – All you pay is a low monthly fee
• Reduced Headaches – Someone else does the backups and fixes problems

Here’s what a local design-build company told me after moving their software and data to the Cloud.

“Putting our Timberline applications on the cloud saves us money and eliminates all of the usual IT problems… [and] the data security of the cloud means I can sleep at night.”

The construction company owner above once ran into a burning building to rescue his server. Now his software and data are housed in a secure data center.

Moving your applications and data to the Cloud with hosting can be done at any time. Just make sure it gets into the budget for next year. The benefits, lower IT costs and fewer headaches, make it a no-brainer. And, you can be a hero:

Budgeting Hero Checklist

• Do I need to upgrade my servers next year?
• Do I want to reduce my total IT costs?
• Do I want fewer IT headaches so I can focus more on what I do best?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, hosting can solve the boss’s budget crisis and make you a budgeting hero.

Click here for more information about Timberline Hosting, or call me, Kent Sorensen, at 480-423-8300.

I want to know what you think. What are some of your concerns about hosting?

•