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Upgrading your business tech could be necessary for helping your business to grow and for keeping up with competitors. It could be particularly necessary if your old technology is starting to wear out.

While there may be clear reasons as to why you should upgrade, taking the step can be daunting. You’ll have to learn how to use the new tech, you’ll have to dedicate time to the setup and you need to be sure that you can afford to make the upgrade. Below are just a few ways in which you can overcome the fears of upgrading to new technology. 

Overcoming the fear of change

There can be a comforting familiarity in old technology. After years of using it, you may have learn to master it and you may be able to easily train employees how to use it. Adopting new technology could mean having to relearn everything and then retrain your employees. 

However, the learning curve doesn’t have to necessarily be steep. Some tech is more user-friendly than others – by doing your research and taking advantage of free trials and demos, you can work out which tech is easiest to use. If you’re making a big jump, consider signing yourself and your employees up to a course. This could save you having to train your staff yourself and you could all help each other to then familiarise yourself with the new tech. 

Choosing reliable technology to upgrade to

Some business owners fear that they may choose the wrong tech solution. Your current tech may be robust and may suffer from few faults – what if you then trade this for a machine or program that constantly breaks?

Reading reviews is the best way to determine how reliable a machine or piece of software is. If other users seem to hold it in high regard, you can usually guarantee that it won’t continuously break on you. Very new tech may not have many reviews, so you may want to wait until a machine or program has been out for a year before investing in it. 

Handling the setup itself

While you may see the importance of upgrading your phone system or migrating your database, you may not have any idea how to do it. The complexity of the setup could be another fear that is putting you off.

The solution to this could be to outsource support. There are specialist database migration services out there that can help you migrate to AWS and specialist phone line engineers that can set up a digital PBX or VoIP system. Don’t feel that you have to handle the setup manually yourself. 

Funding your new technology

The cost of upgrading to new technology can also put off many business owners. However, there may be simple solutions to this too.

Many forms of machinery can be leased or bought on finance to reduce upfront costs. Similarly many forms of software can be paid on a monthly basis rather than in annual instalments. By shopping around and negotiating with vendors, you may be able to reduce these monthly costs and get the best deal. This is often much more practical than buying technology outright.