Veterinary Clinic Embraces Technology, Provides Award Winning Care To Patients

Perrysburg Animal Care, in Perrysburg, Ohio, was founded by Dr. Wayne North in 1978 with a focus on quality veterinary care throughout the life of a family’s pet. As the practice has grown over the years, Dr. North has embraced technology as a way to provide award winning care for his patients and their owners.

“We use our computers and network in every aspect of our practice,” explained Polly Fitzwater, Perrysburg Animal Care’s office manager. “We are a full electronic charting facility.

Perrysburg Animal Care, located in a beautiful, modern facility in Perrysburg, Ohio, offers clients routine preventive care for young, healthy pets; early detection and treatment of disease as pets age; and complete medical and surgical care as necessary during a pet’s lifetime.

Each examination room has a tablet computer, and our doctors and technicians all enter patient information at the time of service.”

The veterinary office relies on a Windows Server 2003 network, combined with several desktop computers for reception and billing. Tablet PC’s are integrated via a high speed wireless network, which lets staff move between patients with ease.

High speed Internet access with firewall protection lets the staff and doctors conduct research and look up information quickly. Complete medical records charting is provided by a specialized line of business application, and the office uses Quickbooks for accounting and payroll.

“Tech Experts provides us with efficient and expedient service,” explained Polly, “which is why we’d never be tempted to search for a new service company. The level of expertise the technicians have and their friendly, professional manner couldn’t be duplicated by another firm.”

“The service technicians ‘blend in’ with our busy office,” continued Polly. “They don’t interrupt our work and get things done fast. Tech Experts keeps us humming!”

For more information about Perrysburg Animal Care, call 419-874-8974, or www.TheBestVet.com.

How To Prevent Downtime On Your Network

Ryan Seymour is a service technician and PC hardware specialist with Tech Experts.

With the national average of computer related repairs at $95 - $125 per hour, a troubled economy, and so many security vulnerabilities lurking around the Internet, getting downtime on networks to a minimum is becoming the number one goal of Computer/IT support companies like Tech Experts.
 
Preventing downtime on your network starts at square one: Who provides your IT support, and what do they have to offer to ensure you’re getting a high quality support at a reasonable cost to your business. With the right kind of IT support, your employees can focus on their own work and maintain a high level of productivity, without the hassle of downtime.

Using a service company to manage your network can be done in a variety of different ways, but for the most part, there are two main forms of service:  Break-fix, better known as pay as you go, or managed service protection (MSP).  So the big question is: Which is right for your company?
 
So what are the key differences between the two?  We’ll start with the break fix approach. 

This is the standard service model – when something breaks, you call your service provider and they repair it. For some companies, particularly smaller networks, this works very well. The costs are relatively low, but every time you have an issue, there’s a cost involved. Oftentimes, you’re reluctant to call for support for what seems to be a “minor” issue. Instead, you save them up to combine service visits. The problem comes in when what seems to be a minor issue is really something more significant.
 
On the other hand, we have the managed service model.  This type of service delivery plan  is designed to provide a high level of IT support to a company at a fixed IT budget, so there are no surprises. 

Typically, a fixed monthly price negotiated by the IT support company and the client.  There are usually different levels of support, starting from basic support of servers, workstations, and network devices, all the way on up to fully managed networks. 

The highest level of support typically gives the business “whatever it takes” support, meaning that whenever you have an issue, it’s taken care of, and again the price stays as agreed.  It’s always in the best interest of the managed service provider to maintain maximum uptime for your network.

Managed service provides full network maintenance, and proactive management, reducing the number of future issues, which again keeps your network uptime maximized, which ensures productivity is at the highest level possible. 

There’s usually no minimum or maximum number of users, which provides scalability for your network, giving it room to grow in the future. No matter how large your company might grow, your managed service provider will provide peace of mind in keeping your network up and running at full proficiency. 

Lastly, there is typically a hardware replacement plan in place.  Because the MSP is monitoring your network at all times, they actually create a “map” of the entire infrastructure, which gives the company the age and health of the equipment on the network. In most cases, you’ll have insight into which hardware needs to be replaced ahead of time, which lets you budget for equipment upgrades.

Overall, I think a managed service is the way to go. It provides the business with peace of mind that the entire network is being monitored, recurring issues are prevented, costs and hidden fees are eliminated, and network growth is scalable and affordable.

Top Four Threats Attacking Your Network And What You Can Do About Them

Corey Bogedain is a network technician and web developer with Tech Experts.

Do you ever feel like your computer network could be more secure? Chances are, keeping a few simple things in mind will improve security and reduce downtime. Here are some things to look out for.

Social Networking Sites

Social networking sites like Facebook are exploding in popularity. Threats range from malware (e.g. viruses, worms,spyware) to scammers trying to steal your identity, information and money. Many businesses and government agencies are
using these sites to communicate with clients and constituents, so simply blocking access is no longer reasonable. Defending your company while allowing employee access requires social network education for your employees and the enforcement of strong acceptable use policies. We can help you develop a policy, then monitor compliance using a Unified Threat Management device that controls and reports on network
access.

Attacks On Mobile Devices

Everyone is going mobile these days not just the “road warriors.” Once limited to laptop computers, mobile network devices now include PDAs, handheld computers and smart phones, with new appliances appearing in the stores every month. Mobile devices often contain sensitive data yet they are easily lost or stolen. Be sure to password protect and encrypt data on all mobile devices whenever possible. Include mobile devices in your acceptable use policy.

Cloud Computing

“The Cloud,” in its most simple form, involves using the Internet to access and store your data. When you access email using a web browser, you are working in “the cloud.” Using the cloud for automated off site backup is rapidly gaining popularity and is just the beginning. Companies like Microsoft, IBM and Google envision the day when we will use inexpensive terminals instead of computers to run programs and access data located somewhere on the Internet. You need to be sure that any data you store and access across the Internet is secure not just where it is stored, but during the trip to and from the Internet.

Overconfidence

User overconfidence in security products is the top threat to your network. Failure to “practice safe software” results in nuisance attacks like porn storms (unstoppable rapid fire pornographic pop-ups) and more subtle key loggers that steal passwords. Surveys promising free stuff, result in theft of information like your mother’s maiden name, high school, etc. used to answer common security questions leading to theft of otherwise secure data. Think before you click!

Web Advertising Tips To Increase Traffic And Leads

A great way to get your small business name out there is to advertise on the web. If you already have a website, there are many things you can do to increase traffic to your site.

The number one key for people to find your website is to have great keywords on your site so that search engines such as Google and Yahoo will see your website. The purpose is so that anyone online can open the search engine and type in some keywords and your website will be listed. The better the match and the more people that click on your website will determine how high you will rank on the search engines.

Every chance you get online, list your website address. When you print out documents to give to customers or business cards make sure to include your web address. Even online, when signing up for a forum or sending a email, make sure you include your website.

You can also create a blog on your website to post articles related to your business. This will help people using search engines looking for something related to your business to be able to find your website. Some people think it is very expensive to create a blog but you can actually find free blogs online and then point your website in the direction of these blogs.

Posting coupons on your website will help attract people too. There is nothing more appealing to customers than saving money.  This will get the customers wanting to check your site frequently just to see the new sales or coupons you’re posting.

Sending e-mails to customers can also help advertise. This will keep your customers up to date on whats new with your business and any other information you would like them to know. Also most people now days have e-mail addresses and spend at least a few hours a week sending and receiving e-mails. Make sure you only send e-mails to people who have given you permission; otherwise, you’re spamming.

Take advantage of free classified ads online. Just like in the newspaper, websites such as Yahoo have classified ads that anyone can post to and their business will be listed.

Create a banner for your website and post it on banner exchange websites. These websites have you put one of their advertisements on your site in exchange for them advertsing your banner on thousands of other websites.

Is There A New Computer In Your Future? Here’s A Tip To Help You Transfer Your Important Information!

Robert Saylors is a senior network technician and hardware specialist with Tech Experts.

It eventually has to happen, we need a new computer. You can buy one from the “BIG BOX” stores, or order online or worse yet buy one from “Freddie” on the corner, but the time will come that you need a new computer.
 
The technology advances so fast it is hard to grasp what you need, what the kids need, and what should you buy that will give you the most bang for your buck.

A bigger concern is: “What will you lose?” When you upgrade your computer, it’s important to preserve the “my documents” and “my photos” folders.

How can you transfer them to your new computer and not lose them?

If you are running Microsoft Windows XP, you are in luck. Not only does Windows provide you with a file transfer wizard, they have a feature called profiles.

Each person who has logged in to a Windows computer had created a profile that has all of  their favorites, documents, music, and photos stored in an easy to transfer directory structure.

The secret is in knowing how to move them to the new computer.  It is very easy. I mentioned thumb drives and external storage in my last article.  Using your external storage, it’s relatively simple to transfer things over. Since each person who uses the computer has their own profile, all of their information is stored separately - all you need to do is find your profile, which is under your user name and then copy the folder which is named after your login name. 

For example, if I created a user called “BigBob” then a profile folder called BigBob would also be created. This folder will contain all of my documents, Internet favorites and music if I have saved them to the default location.

Once you find the user’s profile folder, you’d just copy the folder to your external storage or thumb drive. Then, on your new computer, you’d copy the folder back to the same place. I know this gets confusing, but it isn’t that difficult.

Microsoft has developed a way to keep all of your information stored in one central location, and keep each user’s information separate from each other.

This makes it so easy to do the transfer to a new computer.  But to play it safe! If you have very important information, or you haven’t made a recent backup, you may want to use Tech Experts to transfer your data, photos and music to you new system.

We do it every day, and we realize the importance of your data. Give us a call at (734) 457-5000, or e-mail support@mytechexperts.com.