Every business owner wants to make more money, especially IT professionals. Why bother going out and acquiring more clients when there is more opportunity to increase your revenue within your existing client base. What you need to do is find some alternate revenue sources based on technology that differ from the traditional IT services you provide. Your technical expertise can give you a great advantage.

There are an almost limitless number of alternate revenue sources that share your IT skill set. Just think about all the traditional devices that have an IP address now. Security Cameras, Telephones, Photocopiers, even televisions! The list is endless.

Who do you think is a better fit for managing these systems? Some old telephone guy who has no idea what a subnet is or a seasoned IT professional like yourself?

You don’t have to limit yourself to things with IP addresses either, a lot of services take a certain management skill that you have honed over your years providing IT services. Let’s take a look at just a few alternate revenue sources that you should be able to implement with ease.

Managed Print Services: 

Think of the amount of printing your clients do. Shouldn’t you be getting the money from all of the consumables they are purchasing? There are many different ways to implement a managed print solution, so you need to do your research and pick what works for you. Here are two different examples of how you could run a managed print program:

1. Setup a cost per page contract with the client, and offer the printer, paper, toner and maintenance on the printer for a monthly fee.

2. Simply monitor the client’s paper and toner usage and offer “on-demand” delivery of consumables.

Printing is a HUGE cost for most businesses, so why not get a piece.

IP Telephony:

As an IT consultant, you are responsible for a lot of communication systems for your clients. Why not take control of their PBX and manage their phone services as well. Digium offers the Switchvox IP PBX that scales from 30 – 400 users. Cisco has a very nicely priced phone system that will handle 32 users and less.

Telephony equipment has very high markups and replacing analog PBX’s with an IP PBX can offer cost savings to the customer and another revenue source for your business.

Surveillance and Security:

Like telephones, surveillance cameras are going IP too. Who do you think is a better fit for implementing and maintaining an IP surveillance system, a seasoned IT professional or an alarm installer who couldn’t even name one layer of the OSI Model?

There is also a lot of opportunity in installing and monitoring access control and alarm systems.

Audio Visual Systems:

The A/V industry is another market that is being shifted to IP. I handle A/V installation and maintenance for a lot of my clients now. The switching systems are becoming too complex for most “old-school” A/V guys and again IT professionals are taking their place. Technologies like HDMI over IP are really starting to stand out above the rest.

Energy Audits:

Ever wonder how much energy your client’s computers are using? Electricity bills account for a large part of your client’s monthly expenses. Why not monitor and control your client’s power usage. Make more money, save your clients some cash and save the environment! That is a sweet deal. Most power companies offer rebates for energy management software so in a lot of cases there is zero cost for software licensing. The easiest way to get a sale is by saving your clients money, so go save them some cash!

Integration and Business Process Automation:

Integrating a couple systems to speed up a business process or automating tasks for your clients can make things very easy for them. Everybody is always looking for ways to streamline their businesses, so use your technical skills to make your clients business processes as efficient as possible.

These are just a few examples. The idea is to be creative and see if you can fill a need that other providers are or are not doing now. The key is to use your existing relationship and skills to save your clients time and money.