Maybe you’ve been in an underwhelming office space for too long, and now it’s time to move on, or your business is going from strength to strength. As such, you need to move to a bigger location to accommodate new employees, and start on an exciting road to a new business life. Everyone is upbeat because the new mobile shelving units have been installed, all the furniture is new and everything seems great! But, the big problem we have when moving business locations is productivity. Specifically downtime. It is one of the major concerns when moving to a new business location. After all, moving is one of the most stressful things anybody can undergo, moving office is even more stressful. And wild downtime can’t be completely avoided, we can minimise it. How do we do this?

Clear Planning

It’s common sense, but you’d be surprised as to how many businesses don’t get a sufficient plan in place because they’re too busy running the business. If money is an issue, you may have to take things into your own hands, and this can minimise the expenses, but increase the downtime. The simple act of moving is possible in one short, sharp burst. But to do this, you’ve got to pick the right time, but also ensure that it doesn’t overrun. You could hire vehicles yourself, through companies like Squab van hire, and oversee the process yourself, and in one respect, this can make for a smoother operation. But remember, if you don’t plan it properly, there will be issues along the way.

Backup The Data

It’s important to have a working internet connection at your new destination before you move in; this will make for a faster smoother transition in terms of setting up the equipment. But, because you will be moving a lot of devices from one place to another, you could run the risk of losing a lot of data during transit. Backing up the data, either by putting it all on a cloud storage facility or getting an external storage device to house the information, is common sense.

Communicate With Your Customers

While downtime from the perspective of a business needs to be minimised, you can’t underestimate how your customers will feel as well. Communicate with your customers; it’s far better for you to tell them that you anticipate a little bit of downtime while undergoing a major transformation. After all, it’s for their benefit. You can highlight what your plans are for the new location, meaning that you can expand the business in so many different ways that they will directly see the benefits.

But if you have customers wanting to contact you, but everything is down, and you’ve not informed them beforehand, who’s to say that they won’t try you again? Instead, make sure that you email them well in advance, but also, provide a backup telephone number just in case there are a few hiccups along the way, and you won’t be back online quickly.

It’s very difficult to minimise downtime, and the time of day is essential, but it’s also about making sure that the customer is well and truly catered for. Preparation is always vital, but make sure that your employees are in the know. Discussing it with your staff well in advance means that they are going to make provisions for downtime, so the business won’t suffer.