Just like the field of medicine it is not very
easy for someone to be an expert in many things
when it comes to technology. In medicine you have
the dentist, chiropractor, ear-nose-throat
specialist, pediatrician, nutritionist,
gynecologist, oncologist, specialized surgeon and
many other fields that are unique. All these
fields require specialized training and
experience.

Technology is as varied in specialization as
medicine is. It covers so much ground from fixing
a computer to managing e-commerce. It is common
for service providers to cross into many
technology fields without knowing what they are
getting into. Let's talk about the players.

The computer guy: This is the person who knows a
little about pretty much "everything" about
technology. Since he/she knows little more than
you do it is easier to believe they have a
solution for everything. In most cases the
computer guy does not know when to seek advice
from someone who is truly an expert at what they
do.

The computer shop: These guys start with putting
desktop computers together and selling them as
white boxes or just fixing a few computers that
had problems. Then they will get into networking
computers. After that comes the dangerous
territory of website design, branding, search
engine optimization, designing web applications
and programming.

Advertising company: Branding, creativity and
promotion of a business is the bread and butter
of an ad agency. Working with printed material,
website design and multimedia productions is a
natural extension. Then they step into everything
from search engine optimizations to customized
programming.

The opportunist: For this person technology is
the next business opportunity and they have tried
many other failed businesses. The opportunist has
a solution for every technology you have. They
only see the successes a technology has had. They
believe this is the thing to do. What they don't
realize is technology is like any other business
because the road to riches is not an easy one.

The good technology provider never claims to have
the solutions for every challenge without
carefully examining the situation. The business
friendly technology service provider specializes
in one area and knows when to delegate and seek
help.