IT Support Case Study - Thomson's Real Estate

Busy Real Estate Office Reduces Costs by 20% and Vastly Improves IT Stability

"Our systems are performing better, going down less, running smoothly and more efficiently and it is costing us less money."

Jason Sharpe, Director

Background

Jason Sharpe is the director of Thomson Real Estate, a growing organisation with branches throughout Melbourne. Each of the nine offices are independent agencies that work together as a co-operative, with a shared services model for marketing, procurement, IT infrastructure and website management.

The company is seen as a technology-savvy organisation, but up until 2007 their IT ‘solution’ was more like an IT ‘nightmare’. Aside from a general dissatisfaction with the IT service they had been receiving, they experienced a major system failure, which forced them to make a change.

"Technology has been one of the key drivers in the transformation of property sales and management," Mr. Sharpe said. Buyers are far more informed and the industry is so competitive. Information and communications technology is the core of just about all of our business processes and engagements with buyers, sellers and owners.

As is the case with most industries, the Internet has totally changed the landscape. It is the main way that buyers and sellers interact in today’s marketplace so at the back end of that you have to have reliable systems and data management strategies to support business operations such as marketing, communication, listing, billing and accounting."

Desired outcomes

Restore faith and trust in IT systems after previous bad experiences with other providers
Establish predictable monthly IT costs with measurable results and transparent activities
Eliminate lost revenue caused by IT downtime, problems or unresolved issues
Transform IT from a business expense into a business enabler which aids growth and improves products and services
Secure, high-speed, remote access to data and business applications for improved productivity of staff who are on the road

"What we needed was a partner that would help us effectively manage and evolve our existing infrastructure to keep up with the latest trends, support the growth of the business and meet the changing requirements of the marketplace. It was also important that we didn’t spend a fortune in the process."

Solution

Complete review of existing technology infrastructure and service provision arrangements to find and address main areas of concern
Activate the LANserve Care Plan to monitor the network and system performance remotely, add security functionality including anti-virus protection, patch management and identity management.
Maintain detailed logs detailing all work undertaken to ensure the organisation knows what has occurred, when it was fixed and how it will affect the company and staff.
Develop a long term strategy for IT solutions to help staff increase their productivity by focusing on what they know rather than spending time fixing computer problems.

"LANserve provides us with a systematic approach to the management of things such as security patches, updates and virus protection. Emerging IT is now overseeing all this routine maintenance for us so that we never have to deal with it.

We get regular reports where they document all maintenance and monitoring activity on individual systems and the network including any configuration changes that have been made or issues that have been identified and addressed. We are pre-warned with a courtesy call of any activity that may affect system performance but generally it just happens in the background and we never know about it."

Results

Reduced IT costs by 15-20% through controlled procedures and ongoing maintenance
High-speed, remote management of 11 servers and 87 personal computers for one standard monthly fee
Vastly improved stability (no downtime) and security of IT systems and personal data
Extensive reporting of all work gives complete transparency
Remote management of almost all IT issues with physical, on-site infrastructure checks every 3 months

"From a business owner’s perspective, it is great," Mr. Sharpe said. "Where we once had someone come on-site for a day every week, now I hardly ever see our service provider and our IT infrastructure has never been more reliable.

It is also a great benefit for us to have a manageable and predictable monthly cost that covers the majority of our IT overheads. LANserve agreement means that we don’t have to cringe every time we open the mail because we know what the IT bill is going to be.

As the result of our relationship with Emerging IT, there is now a great deal of forward planning and strategy applied to our IT systems. We are well aware of exactly where we are today and we have a clear view of where we want to be in six months, one year and two years time."