Information technology is always on the go and your business can only survive if you keep up with the pace. If you’re not eager to adopt the latest trends, you will be overtaken by your competitors who will gladly take over your disgruntled customers.

Yes, that is the bottom line: customer satisfaction.

People today are very picky about the service they expect and get. Who can blame them? Every business finds itself in a cutthroat competition that forces them to pamper anyone that they remotely think will spend a cent with them.

This is why you should make sure your online business runs smooth and fast – for their sake, mostly.

Below, we will see some technology upgrades you need to make to ensure this performance enhancement:

1. Upgrade your Hardware

Your business’ hardware is the engine that it all runs on. With slow machines that work intermittently, you are risking your clients’ satisfaction by offering them a service that lags and drops randomly.

In an age when the price of hardware is dropping in comparison to the quality and capacities they provide, there is simply no excuse to hold back on spending some money on upgrades.

Apart from improving the customers’ experience, you will be happy to know that employees with newer (but not-necessarily flashier) hardware on their desks feel much more appreciated and happier while performing their tasks than those that have to make do with ancient machines.

2. Ram in some RAMs

If you think you can’t justify overhauling your whole hardware, then the least you can do is to push up your current devices’ performances improving their processing power. Therefore, the easiest – and most cost-effective way to achieve this – is to upgrade the RAM in your laptops, desktops and servers.

3. Use Multiple Monitors

This may come as a surprise to you, but having multiple monitors, instead of the traditional one helps improve productivity. Studies have shown that productivity and user satisfaction has, in some instances been improved by around 50% – that is a serious figure you would definitely want to take advantage of.

The main advantage here is that you and your colleagues will spend much less time looking for the right application and toggling to-and-from it.

4. Move to the Cloud

If you haven’t done so by now, right now is the time to make the move to the cloud. This technology has been with us for quite some time now and as an online business you have probably heard about its advantages, some of which include enhanced performance, global accessibility, better collaboration, enhanced security and cost effectiveness.

It doesn’t matter what type of business you run, there is a cloud configuration that will meet and surpass your business’ demands and requirements. All it takes is doing a little research and adopting the most efficient one.

5. Security Overhaul and Upgrade

Just as technology is rapidly evolving so too is the mind of the average hacker. They are getting smarter and much more efficient at getting to the data they are not supposed to get their hands on. But then again, the technology behind intrusion detection and prevention software is also rapidly evolving trying to keep up with the bad guys.

Therefore, now would be a good time to do a sit-rep on the current status of your business’ security – starting from the basic individual computers and mobile devices all the way to your data servers and your web hosting package over at your hosting providers’.

You can never be too safe – take into account all your security software and hardware and see how you can improve their performance.

6. Get Faster Connectivity

Unless you happen to be living in the developing world (and that too isn’t too good an excuse when those countries have improved their internet connectivity) you can’t afford to let your clients suffer a slow internet connection. As a matter of fact, it isn’t even fair to you and your employees.

Every second an email is unnecessarily delayed, every interruption during an online chat or in a VoIP conference calls…etc., can quickly add up to badly affect your business’ performance. While you’re at it, get a second internet line just as an emergency backup solution.

Also, if you haven’t done so, move to Gigabit Ethernet to improve your in-house connectivity by 10 folds.

7. Encourage your Colleagues to Embrace New Technology

Finally, remember that no matter how hard you may work towards putting all the latest technology and gadgets at your colleagues’ and employees’ disposal, it will all be to no avail if they do not think they are gaining something from it – both individually and collaboratively as an enterprise.

Therefore, make sure you and your employees are on the same page when it comes to why you are upgrading their devices and altering the way things are done. In short, let them know why you are taking them out of their comfort zones and from the ______ ways they are used to doing things.