Business Solutions & Software Group Blog

How well-maintained are your business’ critical IT solutions? Before you answer, you should know that we’re referring to more than just running the occasional virus scan or update - we’re talking about keeping up on the status of your entire infrastructure. To really do so, we put an assortment of tools and services to use to keep up comprehensive records.

The data stored on your computer is valuable, and that’s a fact. Unfortunately, this means that there are unscrupulous characters out there who will want to get at this data, so you will need to have the right solutions in place to protect it. Part of this will require you to have a firewall included in your protections.

Cybercrime has been on the rise over the last few years, and it doesn’t look like it will be slowing down anytime soon. As it turns out, bad actors can turn a profit by targeting businesses, and their tools and tactics are only getting trickier.

In business, Portable Document Format (PDF) documents are encountered constantly. The benefit is that they are a great way to share and receive documents on any device. One main problem many people run into is that they think that it’s a read-only format. Today, we turn this common misconception on its head by providing some tips on how to better manipulate the PDFs you receive. 

Fortunately, businesses are doing more to secure their data. It wasn’t always so, but with the current threat landscape the way it is, it is essential that business owners do what they can to protect their data. A critical part (but not the only part) of this is to back it up. Today, we will take a look at data backup and explain how it has to be an essential part of your business’ cybersecurity strategy

In order for a business to succeed, it needs to create the proper relationships with a variety of parties. From their clients and customers, to their vendors, to other businesses they work with, the average business has a lot of contacts they need to manage - which is why a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) application is so valuable.

If you have used Microsoft Word, there’s a very good chance that you’ve become irritated at the occasional insistence that when you type, sometimes Word will make seemingly random adjustments to the formatting of dates, hyphenated content, and other elements. Here, we’re offering some tips to help you put a lid on these irritating changes.

As a managed IT services provider, we are constantly trying to find the most effective ways to communicate just how much value our services can bring a business, nonprofit, or municipal organization. Since almost all organizations rely heavily on their technology, it stands to reason that getting the most value out of their IT support should be a priority. In many ways, managed IT services are the answer to this issue. Let’s look at some of the most valuable parts of using managed services. 

With just days before Microsoft retires two of its most popular operating systems, the quarter of computer users worldwide are at the risk of losing support on January 14, 2020. Therefore, we wanted to take this opportunity to explore the ramifications of an end of support event, and what you can do in response.

We all want to make our businesses more efficient, because the more efficient a business is, the more effective it can be. One clear way to do so is to boost your business’ organization tactics - both literally, and more abstractly. For today’s tip, we’ll cover what we mean, and share a few strategies for you to employ.

With most everything having gone digital, most consumers have changed their preferred payment method. Many different factors contribute to credit cards becoming the most used payment. Today, we take a look at why this has become a popular means of payment, as well as weigh the pros and cons of credit cards. 

For the average PC user, the Internet browser is probably the most utilized piece of software other than your OS. Depending on which browser you use, you may decide to download additional software to give you features that you typically don’t have or give you functionality that is all new. Before you use these software add-ons, you should know that there have been several examples of this software working against users. Let’s take a look at how browser extensions work and how you can get better functionality without putting your data at risk. 

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and with all the work done,
The office was closing for some holiday fun;
Their coats buttoned up, they had all saved their files,
Everyone’s face creased in a big, toothy smile.

To those who weren’t around BEFORE the Internet became an irreplaceable business tool, it’s almost hard to imagine how businesses operated when this tool didn’t exist. Storing sensitive data has never been such an easy thing to do but at what cost? It is undeniable that the Internet has opened doors for not only us, but criminals as well. Today we discuss how these doors can easily be secured with the implementation of a virtual private network, or VPN.

Memes are some of the most popular--and important--ways people communicate. Today, we will go over what makes the Internet meme special and we’ll show you some of our favorite IT memes.

Let’s face facts: as critical to your security as they are, passwords are kind of the worst. Of course, since they are so critical, you need to make sure all of the ones you use are as secure as possible, so we’ve assembled some practices that may help you tip the scales in your favor. Spoiler alert: the conventional password may not be your first choice for much longer.

If you own a business today, you use the Internet. Chances are about as good that it plays a key role in your daily functioning, which means you need to be sure that your network is well-maintained and functioning equally well. Here, we’ll go over a few ways you can get an idea of how healthy your network is.

In a very real way, the Internet has spoiled us, to the point that we fully expect an order to be in our hand in 72 hours - oftentimes, far less than that. Shipping speeds like these are now possible thanks to the use of advanced logistics. If you’re starting to incorporate ecommerce into your business, or distribution has proved troublesome, you may want to consider a fleet management system.

2.4 billion users actively use Facebook. That’s a lot of information that passes by the Facebook servers each day. One problem that Facebook has had over the past several years is dealing with personal data privacy. With it becoming a larger concern for individuals and businesses, alike, and we thought we would take a look at the Facebook privacy settings to see how you can better control your individual privacy.

If you haven’t read part one of our Facebook privacy blog, it wouldn’t hurt for you to go back and read that one first. Today, we will be looking at configuring your Facebook with security settings designed to protect your personal information. The social media giant certainly has a checkered history when it comes to protecting user privacy. In fact, a lot of its ongoing troubles center around maintaining individual privacy of its users.