Can you afford to stand still?
When considering to investing in technology/software for your business, there are a few important questions to consider.
- What will the technology add to your business?
- You need to know exactly how many steps your new technology might eliminate from your current processes?
- How much will new technology improve your service to clients?
- How much better will your overall service offering be?
- And how much of a competitive advantage with it give you in your core business area?
However, the biggest question to ask is can you afford not to invest?
Many successful companies put technology and software at the heart of their investment strategy. Think of a company investing in tangible equipment and machinery which delivers a direct benefit. The cost of the investment is the cost of the machinery; the cost of not investing is the loss of those benefits and the impact this might have on productivity, customer relations and sales. In the same way, you need to assess the costs to your business of not investing in new technology.
In the current climate a unique selling point is more critical than ever. Investment is key, and the real cost of the missed opportunities from not investing may well outweigh the value of the investment on your balance sheets.
6 reasons why you should be investing in technology:
- Processing speed: New technology generally allows for things to get done more quickly. Time is money. When you can get things done with more speed, you can increase both your cash flow and revenue and focus on other more important things.
- Efficiency: Advancements in tech usually make things work more efficiently. This cuts down on errors made in the workplace and may allow you to handle larger workloads. Efficiency also reduce time wasted on error handling, and may reduce the steps necessary in a process.
- Innovation: Innovation provides a long list of benefits from improved performance to increased confidence. Innovation is crucial to any business for many reasons, so it is imperative that your business be up to date with all of the relevant technological upgrades.
- Return on investment: Although investing in tech involves a certain amount of expense, it will usually end up saving you a great deal of money over a longer period of time. You can then use this money in lots of ways including more reinvestment in your organisation.
- Competitive advantage: One of the most important reasons for you to invest in new technology is because it will give you an advantage over your competition. However, your competition may already have this advantage, so you will need the new technology just to catch up.
- Growth: The most important thing is growth in the future, investment in technology will result in a greater scalability for the future. Improvements in various technological developments tend to promote expansion in a myriad of ways. This is why you should always be seeking to gain new technological advancements and then finding as many ways to make use of all of the new benefits.
