Image by Arek Socha from Pixabay
Businesses in all industries have to stay up to date with the latest technologies if they want to avoid lagging behind their rivals.
Technology is evolving faster than ever and it is impossible to know for sure how the world will be reshaped in the next few years. But one thing is for certain. To remain competitive, a business has to keep up with the trends.
At the moment, video chat apps are booming along with numerous collaboration platforms due to the pandemic. But since companies have realized how good these software solutions are, there are high chances that they are here to stay no matter the situation.
If you too would like to stay up to date and run a modern operation that is attractive both for future employees and clients, take a look below. This guide is here to help you modernize the processes and make your whole company better and more effective.
Online collaboration tools
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The modern workplace is inevitably changing. Many companies have abandoned offices altogether, and even those that are still operating from office spaces use collaboration tools to improve the overall efficiency.
Now, if you want to improve communication and collaboration, if you want a fast exchange of files between your employees, your business needs a collaboration platform.
- First of all, a good collaboration platform will save you a lot of time. When members collaborate fast, your business has more time to achieve the end goal.
- Collaboration tools are also excellent when it comes to boosting team chemistry. Team members become comfy with the concept of working together to reach a common goal. Also, using a platform of this kind certainly makes them feel like a team.
- The best bit about these tools is that businesses can enjoy better project management when using them. Managing a project or a team is difficult when such a platform is not implemented.
One good platform of this kind is Microsoft SharePoint. This tool makes daily business tasks easier, satisfies regulatory requirements, and gives a consistent user experience.
On top of that, if you already have a similar platform and would like to move to SharePoint without losing any data, you may seek SharePoint migration services. When cross-platform transitions happen, files tend to get lost. But if you use a good migration service, you will prevent that from happening.
Consider VoIP technologies
Every business with a concern for cost-effective telecommunication solutions should consider moving to VoIP technologies. A VoIP telephone system utilizes IP to make calls. Instead of using telephone lines, all communication data is turned into packs and sent over the IP network.
The IP network your company uses could be your internet connection, a direct IP connection to your telephone service provider, or a combination of both.
The best part regarding the IP connection is that there is a guaranteed quality of service (QoS) from the telephone service provider’s network to the office network. Additionally, VoIP services can be a huge benefit to your business if it is ‘on-the-go’.
On a common phone system, a line that runs to a business is assigned a phone number and any movement that takes place then becomes a trial of remembering the correct codes or keys to dial on your phone.
A lot of time can be wasted by contacting phone companies to transfer services and phone numbers to new locations. However, with a VoIP system, this is eliminated. There are no physical boundaries.
Before you go ahead and purchase a VoIP plan from a provider, make sure to check the reviews, and always read a VoIP phone service buyer’s guide. This will help you determine the absolute best VoIP solution for your business.
Website security
Image by Werner Moser from Pixabay
Having a secure website today is more important than ever. Cybercrime is a real thing and many businesses have suffered huge losses just because they neglected security.
On top of that, SEO is more important than ever. Being placed high up in the results seems to be a signal for modern customers that a web store is the real deal.
But, how can security and SEO be tied together? Well, they can, thanks to HSTS.
A security layer called HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) is there to help protect your website and your search engine optimization efforts too.
To sum it up, HSTS is a response header that informs the browser it can only connect to a certain website using HTTPS. It increases both the speed and security of HTTPS websites.
HSTS makes a website load over HTTPS disregarding any calls to try an HTTP connection first as in the case of 301 redirects. This circumvents the initial HTTP load by forcing the browser to remember that the site supports HTTPS.
This way, the browser loads the secure version instantly and eliminates the opportunity for hackers to intercept and hijack the connection and consequently compromise a website.
When it comes to the SEO boost, the concept is quite easy to understand. HSTS makes a web page load quite fast.
Load time is a huge deal when it comes to search rankings and user experience. And when we consider that mobile usage is increasing, page load speed time is extremely important. So, if you want your website to load as fast as lightning, you need to enable HSTS.
Mobile payments
A year ago, the world witnessed a boom in contactless payment use. This trend seems to be unstoppable and it looks like there will be less and less use for physical money.
Therefore, businesses must embrace mobile payments. Companies that do not accept this will soon be seen as laggards by their customers and will certainly fall behind.
For instance, if a small business fails to accept mobile payment while other businesses incorporate them, this will only serve as another reason for people to move to other bigger retailers.
Even though it may seem unlikely that the world will become cashless any time soon, it is clear that the world is moving towards that. So, make sure to include mobile payments now as they take off. Do not lag when it comes to these payments because implementing them is not too difficult.
If your business is not ready for that change, rest assured that consumers will lose faith in your organization and that can only lead to losses and low conversion rates.
Final thoughts
Innovation is thriving and will continue to thrive in this modern world. These are only a few emerging technologies that will change the way people do business.
It is impossible to predict exactly what the world will look like in ten years. However, the latest trends are already here and some are going to be incredibly impactful
If a business fails to embrace these new and popular technologies, it won’t be long until it completely loses the race and falls too far behind its competitors.
So, why wait? It is better to be an early adopter than face dire consequences later.
