Answers to Questions About The Computer Business

A few days ago I asked the Technibble readers to ask me a question about the computer business. Here are the answers:

William H asked:
When installing Firefox on a clients computer. Is it immoral to set the homepage to a site I own if the client does not have a preference?

I believe its our responsibility as Computer Technicians to set it to what is most useful for the client, whether you own the site or not. If you happen to have made a site that is useful to them, go for it. If not, its best to set it to Google or something similar.

William H asked:
Using remote software (Teamviewer, Logmein, etc…) whats to stop a client from learning the software tools I use, and using it themselves?

There is nothing to stop the client from learning what you do when you fix their computer. However, in most cases there is a lot more to fixing a computer than just using an application. Its also identifying what the problem is and knowing what the appropriate application is in order to fix it, even if all you had to do is press a button. In my experience, most of my own clients are too scared to load up the antivirus that is already installed on the computer and run a scan because they are afraid they might break something.

Of course, you will always have clients who are tinkerers and will download AdAware or a similar “one-click-fix” application after they saw you use it, but once they hit something that AdAware cant deal with they will probably be calling you again. I wouldn’t worry about it too much.

Jonal C asked:
Ive always had a hard time coming up with prices for my services… I thought about looking at Geek Squad and other businesses so I could of course undercut them.. but by how much? any help would this would be appreciated…

Knowing how to price your services is always difficult. I wish I could tell you what to set your prices to but it is always different depending on where you live. For example, we have some very experienced technicians on the Technibble forums who charge around $40 per hour while another very experienced technician charges $120 per hour. The difference is that that $40 p/h technician lives in a small town in the country where everyone may earn less, but the cost of living is also much lower so the $40 her hour is about right. The $120 p/h technician lives in New York city where the cost of living is much higher so he needs to earn more.

I recommend you call the nearby mom-and-pop computer repair stores and find out their prices so you can get a price range. This will help you get a ball park figure that takes into account the cost of living in your area. Then, try to gauge the experience level of these stores and adjust your price based on where you believe your experience level is at. Once you have a figure in mind, take a look at this article and make sure you have set it high enough to cover your expenses. Don’t try and be the cheapest guy in town because you will most likely attract cheap customers which will make your job a living hell. You need to not only make enough to survive, but to thrive as well.

Tom M asked:
How much web development/design skills should a Tech support technician have?

If you are a computer repair business and would like to expand into doing web development then the developer should have very good HTML and CSS skills to the point where they can easily create a website in notepad without the help of a web page builder. They should have an understanding of web standards and know how to create valid XHTML/CSS markup that can pass the WC3 tests. (Yes, I know Technibble doesn’t pass WC3 tests but its difficult to do so with such a large and constantly changing site. However, I made my clients sites to these standards)

It used to be a case of firing up Frontpage/Dreamweaver, place an image here and some text there, upload to a server and your done. In the past 5 years or so the web has become more standardized and creating webpage’s in WYSIWYG editors without code knowledge is no longer acceptable. Its kind of like your clients 16 year old cousin calling himself a technician because he can run AdAware and a virus scanner.

Learn how to create a web page in notepad without the use of tables (use CSS div’s instead) and make it pass the WC3 tests and you are up to the right standard to do good web development work.

Tim Chesterman asked:
Is there a standard for how long computer repair tasks should take? i.e. Auto mechanics have a book that tells them how long each job should take so that they give an accurate estimate to their customers.

There isn’t a standard on how long a computer repair should take. In order to give your clients a ballpark time you need to base it off your own experience with how long it would take rather than comparing it to some sort of industry standard. What would take me 1 hour to fix might take a beginner two hours.
I try to avoid giving any sort of time and cost estimates but if I must I would say something like:

“Unless I see the computer, I cant give you an exact figure on how long it would take to remove the virus. However, in past repair work I can remove a virus in an hour most of the time. If its a really nasty one, possibly two hours. My rate is…”
This way, they are aware that the time and price can be open ended depending on the situation.

John Souris asked:
Ok,I have one for you. How long is too long at the customer’s home? For
example: On-site virus removal,tune-up,network setup and security.

Similar to the last question, it depends on what work is being done. Personally, I start to feel like I have been on-site for too long after 3 hours. I feel most single issues can be fixed in under 3 hours (not including the client asking you to fix multiple problems). For example, if I am doing a manual virus removal and I am not getting anywhere after 2 hours then I will take it back to my workshop to be formatted.

Ben asked:
I am having a hard time getting a client to get new servers the current servers are over 5 years old. I would love a document to show them that it’s time to replace the systems with new ones

The first thing you need to do is ask yourself “What is the benefit to the client if they were to replace the servers?”. You would probably be thinking that the old servers a slow, may not support the most recent hardware and parts are becoming unreliable.
If the servers are running slow and the employees have to wait for the server to load things then tell them about the increase in productivity amongst employees. It will only be a few minutes each day but after a year that is.. etc.

If the servers older operating system doesn’t support new applications that they want to do, tell them about the new features that are possible with the new operating system. I would also use a little scare marketing and tell them about the security risks involved in having an older operating system (that no longer receives patches) and what could happen in a worst case scenario such as all of their clients personal data or trade secrets getting published on the internet.

If the parts are becoming unreliable then tell them about the failure rates of old hardware and use a little scare marketing again saying “How would your business cope if the server went down right now? How much money would be lost?”.

To convince any client to do anything, you need to tell them how it benefits them. Not you.

Scott asked:
I’ve been in business a year now and I’m struggling financially and I was wondering if it gets any better in the second year? I realize its the toughest the first year but does it get better? Some months I’ve done really good other months nothing.

The first year is always the hardest but it usually gets better. The trick to gaining both income and clients is finding the most effective form of advertising for your business. When I found my most effective form of advertising, it cost me around $95 per week and it would almost always generate at least $300 per week. Also, those clients would continue to use my services later down the track which is where the real money is. I advertised every week and I could come out at least $205 in front while building up my client base. Once you find out a form of advertising that always puts you ahead each week, it gets much easier.

Thanks to those who have sent me any questions so far and if anyone else would like to ask me something please send them in and I will do my best to continue answering them. To those who have asked a question and it wasn’t answered it here, I will be answering them later in a post similar to this or doing a large article about it.