6 Career Killing Mistakes PC Technicians Should Avoid – Part II

Not necessarily! As we discussed in article number one, being a computer technician may have an easy “barrier to entry”, but it takes tons of preparation, skill and good practices to become successful in the IT industry.  Let’s discuss the last 6,  HUGE Career Killing Mistakes That PC Technicians Should Avoid!

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Being a good technician is relative.  What makes a “good tech?”  It depends on the person you are asking to define what a good technician is. Many technicians believe that if they focus on earning as many certifications as possible, they will have an advantage in starting and running a successful PC repair company. That may be true, and may be false. Certifications are used by companies to weed-out applicants that apply for a position, and are gauge to determine whether or not a person can perform the work required by an employer (although a certification never guarantees any level of competency in the actual field).

Customers and businesses looking to hire a PC repair and/or consulting company, care about cost and results. Many have no clue at all what the certification acronyms even mean other than a few letters! MARKETING….MARKETING..MARKETING, is the key to any tech business becoming successful.

Let’s take for example a PC repair tech named Korey, who has several certifications:  MCSE, MCP, A+,  Network+ and Cisco certifications.Korey spends all of his spare time and money taking classes to prepare for more certification tests, and has no marketing plan in place on how to bring in new clients and prospective clients. On the other hand, is a technician named Daniel, who has ZERO certifications, but 10 years of experience servicing residential computer users.

Daniel spends all of his spare money and time finding new and creative ways (free and paid), to market his business offerings. Who do you think will be successful in their business and who do you think will shut down their business shortly after it has started and get a “real job?”  If you guessed Korey will be 9 to 5’ing soon, you are correct! Marketing is THE most important determining factor in the success or LACK of success – of your business, not certifications!

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A major misconception that many technicians makes when deciding to start a computer repair business, is that it is still a business. It is necessary to read, learn and remain adept in the technology

and acquiring more skills, but the legal demands of running a business can prove disastrous if overlooked. You should consider many things when starting a computer business including but not limited to:

Accounting -  will you keep track of the expenses, profit, receipts, tax information, bookkeeping etc, or will you someone else do this for you?

Legal – to avoid or limit liability when dealing with people’s hardware and data, what kind of contracts will you have in place? Do you have a lawyer to create and/or look over the contracts for you? Will you have liability insurance to protect customers that may enter your building (if applicable), or do you have errors and omissions insurance to protect against data and/or equipment loss or malfunction which may or may not be you or your company’s fault? What kind of business will you have; a sole-proprietorship, LLC, S-Corp, C-Corp….?

Customer service -  who will be responsible for creating programs to stay in touch with customers so that they remember your company? What kind of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software will you use to store your contacts, clients, prospects, appointments, to do lists, calendars etc? What kind of warranties will you provide for your service and/or your products?

Technical – what kind of business will you be going after? Will you target friends & family only for business and referrals? Will you target residential computer users? Will you target small or medium sized  businesses?

It will take significant research to determine WHO you will market to as a client, WHAT skill level is required to work with those clients, WHERE these clients are, WHY these clients should work with you instead of countless other technicians and tech companies, and WHEN.

When the target group that you want to have as customers need computer service currently, who do they call and why? There are countless other things to consider when running a tech business, these being most important in my opinion. Learn as much as possible about running a business, and what to expect when running a business before taking the plunge; to minimize costly mistakes and to better “weather the storm” during tough times.

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One HUGE misconception that many techs have is that being experienced troubleshooting and repairing the computers and networks of friends and family, is enough experience to start a business.

Outside of the legal issues that will be encountered when running a PC repair business, many different scenarios will occur and many times you will encounter a problem that you have absolutely no idea how to fix.

When you are charging money for your services, and especially charging people that you do NOT know to repair their computers and/or networks etc, you have to have total confidence that you can resolve any issue that you encounter. If a situation arises and you don’t know how to move forward, you will have to know how to think, rationalize and find answers to solve the problem while under extreme pressure and deadlines.

Yes, customers DO expect deadlines, so it’s best not to learn how to resolve multiple problems while on the customer’s clocks. It is also necessary to learn how to mitigate loss; in other words, how to prevent a client’s problem from becoming a bigger problem than it was initially, and knowing when a problem is beyond your scope of experience. Only take on clients and projects that you can handle as far as skill and confidence to avoid losing credibility and losing your pants. To sum it all up, repairing strangers’ computers as a business is a totally different “ball-game” than repairing computers for friends and family.  Make sure you are prepared for the jump.

Hopefully these 6 tips will help you in your endeavor to become a computer technician, or will help you to become a better and more efficient technician.  As always….