Do You Run A Small Business? Don’t Buy Desktop Software Unless You Have To

Today’s post is a small business story.

Astradental Services is a  5 year old Dental Clinic in Westlands. They have a staff of eight, two operatories (surgery units) and are in the process of acquiring a mobile dental clinic as well. This is a typical young Kenyan business, started small, but with big dreams to change lives.

Last week, I asked them how they do IT in their office. The reason I was asking this is because for small businesses, IT is viewed as  necessary evil. It is needed, but they avoid paying for it as much as they can. It is not uncommon to find this notice on most computers in small businesses in Kenya.

The pirating is worse at software level.  If you are reading this from a personal computer, there’s a high chance that the version of Ms Office you’re running is not original. This is because you, or the person who purchased your computer could not afford the computer plus the software upfront.

The second cost concern for small businesses is that in addition to the initial purchase, every time there is a software upgrade, they will need to pay to get a new version of the software.

To counter the above, Astradental adopted Software As A Service (SAAS) as a way to take their minds off IT. With SAAS, you pay a subscription which entitles you to online access to the program, and a desktop version which updates automatically.

Previously, Astradental  had Ms Office 2010, and when it was time for an upgrade, they decided to go for Office 365, an online product from Microsoft. Office 365 gave them, a small clinic, a personalized, dedicated service across the team. They use Outlook for email, Ms Excel, Ms Word and Ms Powerpoint.

When I spoke to the proprietor, he loved Office 365 for a number of reasons:

1. A low entry point price wise. For as low as Ksh 600 per month, they were able to access software that they would pay times more for. Also for a start up, a low fixed fee is easier to manage, than a huge upfront fee. This gave access to 5 users, all they needed really.
2. They no longer have to worry about purchasing updated software, because the software updates automatically.
3. With the products suite, they are able to do all their office work using Office 365, unlike in the past when they needed Ms Office, a file syncing service, Skype etc, all as separate products.
4. The collaboration element in Office 365 makes it very easy for the team to work on documents together, something that was not possible with a desktop-only solution.

When I first heard about Office 365, I was curious about the hype, and I wondered if it is a solution that would work for Kenya, so I tweeted this question.

Looking for an individual/small business owner that uses Office 365. Pls R/T

— Gatwiri (@RookieKE) May 3, 2016

Some responses:

@rookieke we are looking to move from MS Exchange on Premise to this later in the year. Did simulations & comparisons w/ Google Apps.

— wiselar (@wiselar) May 3, 2016

@RookieKE 1. I was using a mix of Office 2007 + Dropbox. 2. Was introduced to it by my client & got free licenses for a year.

— Wamathai (@Wamathai) May 3, 2016

@RookieKE 0365 has an advantage for all though, they continue to add more features for the same USD 5/6 per user per month offering. ^George

— Logical Crest (@LogicalCrest) May 3, 2016

As you can see in the responses, the solution not only works for small businesses, but bigger companies too. Have you tried Office 365 yet? What do you think about it? If you haven’t heard about it, check it out.