In this issue: 
   Avoid 3 Threats to Profit & Productivity

Hello, and welcome to the Q3 2008 edition of ListenUp!, your source for the latest news and expert advice about the world of business communications.  In our feature article, Troy Sorzano, ETA's IT Strategies and Practice Leader, shares three simple strategies vital to protect your assets and safeguard your margins. 

>>More Articles to Check Out

Insider's Tip: How to Save up to 20% on your Telecom Expenses
Employee Spotlight: Troy Sorzano
Reserve your spot at the Business Continuity Lunch and Learn

>>Avoid 3 Threats to Profit & Productivity

If I asked you the question "What are your top priorities going into 2009?", you'd likely say something like "Growing revenue by 5%" or "Increasing profit by 3.5%" or "Launching my new product line, generating $100,000 in revenue."  

It's probably safe to bet I wouldn't hear "Implementing an integrated business continuity plan to protect against network and email downtime and data loss."

And I wouldn't blame you.  But what you may not realize is that if you don't have an integrated business continuity plan in place that covers the top three threats to productivity and profit: Your ability to send and receive emails, recover your laptops and desktops and get your critical  servers up and running during any interruption in service (not just a disaster!) you're putting all your other goals at risk.

Consider these well published, but often overlooked facts:
    1.  Over 75% of companies will experience a major, non-disaster
         related email outage every year. This number is even more 
         alarming when you consider that up to 70% of a company’s
         business-critical data resides in its messaging systems.
    2. The cost to get a lost or stolen laptop back up and running is
        around $3,000.  The cost to repair the damage caused by its loss
        of data can be up to $13,795,000. 
    3.  40% of companies that lose access to their critical network data
         for 3 days fail within 36 months.  Those that don't go down a full
         day lose an average of $5,000 an hour.  

As scary as these figures are, most small to mid-sized businesses are even more frightened by the cost and complexity of implementing a business continuity solution that gets them covered. 

But here's the good news:  There's a simple and extremely cost-effective way to protect against these three key threats.  ETA's PoweredUp!™ Business Continuity Bundle is an integrated, enterprise-class solution that ensures your ability to send and receive email, recover lost PC and laptop data and restore critical servers during any disruption of service.  In fact, you could be back up and running like nothing ever happened in as little as 24 hours. 

Sound good?  I'd be happy to help you learn more about how ETA can help keep you PoweredUp!™.  Simply click here to send me an email!

-Troy Sorzano, ETA's IT Strategies and Practice Leader

>>Insider's Tip: How to Save up to 20% on your Telecom Expenses

Did you know that companies spend an average of 8-20% over their actual  telecom expenses every month due to erroneous charges, invoicing mistakes, and other uncontrolled expenses?  For a company with $50,000 in
monthly telecom expenses, that amounts to up to $120,000 wasted a year!

Unfortunately, most of these problems aren't easily diagnosed or solved.  Telecom bills are often hard to decipher due to confusing and inconsistent formats and a plethora of ambiguous fees and charges.  And of course, the fact that there are often separate bills for wireless, voice, data, Internet and other services doesn't make things any easier.  So how does anyone even begin to tackle the problem?

You bring in the Experts to help, of course!  Expert Technology Associates has teamed up with iTEMize, a trusted leader in high-value Telecom Expense Management solutions, to help our customers regain control of their telecom dollars.  Our Telecom Expense Management (TEM) solution provides you one Web-based portal to manage and pay all of your communications expenses - wireless, voice, data, Internet, you name it.  We also help you identify inappropriate or erroneous charges so you only pay for what you're using.  You can even set up alerts to notify you when any portion of your telecom bills falls outside what you're expecting so you can follow up with the service provider and resolve any identified issues.

Look for more information about this partnership in the coming months.  If you'd like to learn more now, though, please email me by clicking here.

-Bill Quinlain, Director of Carrier Services