Taking my Side IT jobs and making a IT support business

My apologies for the long post but I wanted to provide some background and context as one thing that stood out to me is developing sound processes for my business that can grow and scale if it ever becomes more than just a 1 girl show. I want to thank this forum and Tom for all their knowledge and expertise that has been shared, I have read many posts and watch many videos in my never-ending search for more understanding.

I have for a number of years done IT related services for friends, family, coworkers and for others within their social circle which has been on a break-fix basis but I want to transition to a support model and reduce the amount of break-fix work in an ideal world. Though running a small business will definitely have its challenges with the proper planning, an open mind and my strong work ethic I believe I can build something solid and beneficial not only to myself but more importantly to the customers that are needing IT related services in my area (Large city in Alberta, Canada). While I won’t be quitting my “day” job I do work shift work and have lots of time off that I want to fill some of it with this business, on average I have 4 days off in an 8-day cycle.

I have secured a domain name for my new company and checked in with my local city about licensing as well as both a small business advisor and an accountant. to arrive at my following next steps to launch the business in order to begin marketing it.

Part of developing strong business processes is decided or shaped around what software or system is used by the business and I wanted to get some feedback on what I have planed for FOSS software to run my company.

  • Public Website: Wordpress
  • Accounting/Invoicing: Invoice Ninja
  • Support Requests: OS Ticket
  • Status Monitor: phpServerMon
  • Password Manager: Bitwarden_RS
  • Cloud Storage/Client Uploads: Nextcloud
  • Documentation: BookStack
  • Document Mgmt: (SeedDMS | Mayan-EDMS) Still a work in progress
  • Inventory: Snipe-IT

I have looked into more all-in-one systems like GPLI but not sure they are the right fit as they tend to have way more features than right now. Part of the drive to us FOSS was to keep operating costs as low as possible while the company is starting and also to not lock into a particular closed format that I find later on might have been the wrong decision. Though something like moving from Bitwarden_RS to paid Bitwarden is something that I see happening fairly soon after my client base starts to gain traction. I will be self-hosting all of my business software using my home network which is mostly old enterprise and prosumer equipment. The only large SPOF is my single internet connection to my house.

I have also been developing a documentation package using my home/lab network to help build a template or both intake of a new client and also to track clients once they are onboarded but right now they are mostly just text files for simplicity.

My plan is to get as sound of a process as possible for the various tasks and services I will be providing when I start off and then from there follow these steps to launch the company which will be done for right now as a sole proprietor.

  1. Register a business number with the CRA (Canada Revenue Agency)
  2. Register my business as a Trade Name with the Registry (DMV like entity)
  3. Update the CRA with my Trade name and request a GST number
  4. Open a business bank account
  5. Get a business ph#
  6. Get business cards made
  7. Launch the public website
  8. Market/network like crazy

I would also greatly appreciate and welcome any other tips, advice, cautions, words of wisdom or guidance anyone has to share as I being taking and making this business a reality.

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Welcome to starting your own business and #8 on your list will be the biggest challenge. That challenge will be even more so if you don’t have a clear offer to you prospective clients so make you are prepared to answer the question “What do you do?”

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Hi,

I would get a remote access tool, something like splashtop, TeamViewer or Zoho assist. msp360 actually have a free tool available at the moment.

Also liability insurance is a must.

I would also join techstogether.com , no minimums and you can then offer bitdefender and Malwarebytes for clients that need it.

Hey Astraea welcome fellow canadian! I’m working on something in a similar phase in another province. Maybe we should talk, possibility to collaborate on something that has a larger reach? I’d love to have a chat.

Your first step should be getting the experience.

Call up some local schools. Ask if they want any IT help. Tell them you’ll work for free for the experience.

This will give you an idea of what you want to be doing, what your focus is and you can always reference an actual project you did when talking to potential clients. It’s always a good way to then build leads as well.

I am going through a similar issue myself this is very great content I hope you the best and launching your side it job and making it a big business
I too as well are launching my own cyber security firm AT intek systems. Us

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I wish you all the best on your way of creating a super agency. Nowadays a cyber-security is not just a term, it is a reality we all should count.

My father used to have his security agency as well. Well, not the one that is connected with cyber field but mostly a physical guarding sphere. And recently I have hired for him a team in marketing agency https://famesters.com/tiktok-influencer-marketing/ that helped him to call for new clients. Some videos were so funny and serious at the same time, that things got better within short period of time.

Maybe you need something similar as well?

Hi @Astraea,

I have worked with both OSTicket and GLPI extensively and I would highly recommend GLPI over OSTicket, even if you just do the helpdesk. GLPI is better geared out of the box for an IT support service desk while OSTicket is a good basic helpdesk. GLPI is also more actively maintained than OSTicket as a project and is hugely more capable in an IT context.

GLPI is also one of the best inventory tools you will come across and you can link documents to any tickets, items or other objects so you won’t need SnipeIT or Mayan as separate systems (although these are both fantastic so not dissing them at all.)

You refer to GLPI as ‘All in One’ which it is, but you don’t have to implement everything in one go - get the helpdesk set up for incident and service request management, then look at inventory and go from there. Start with where you are and take what you need most.

If you still decide that you don’t want to go with GLPI, I would these days recommend looking at Zammad over OSTicket for a starightforward general helpdesk - it’s a bit more modern than OSTicket.

Hope that helps. Good luck with your venture!

EDIT: New to the forum, didn’t notice this thread was 3 years old :man_facepalming:

Ironically I am in the midst of redoing my at home network and homelab and as a result my business infrastructure is also getting some updates/upgrades and I am retooling some of my software at the same time. I have a few clients now and while mostly web design and management for them at this time it is a start towards just break fix on home systems / hardware. I had one client ask me about hosting their site myself and that conversation is what led me to try and get a resilient of an infrastructure as possible to see if that is something I could offer a few of my clients.

I am looking as moving from OS Ticket to something like GLPI even if only for the help desk related stuff as OSTicket especially if run in a Docker container is not kept up to date.