Business in the 21st century depends heavily on technology. The Internet, voicemail and email have changed the technological landscape of business forever. Today, even small businesses can invest in technologies to cut costs and increase productivity. The most important goals of any business are to maintain open communication with customers, get new customers interested, and turn those interested customers into buyers. More importantly, technology can remove some of the worries associated with doing business such as security. While no business operation is completely secure, three technology solutions in particular can assure the business of a secure enterprise.

Secure USB Drives

Universal Serial Bus (USB) drives or flash drives are some of the most ubiquitous products on the market. Flash memory uses solid-state technology to store digital data. A USB drive has no moving parts, so it is noiseless. The technical term for flash memory is Electronically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory (EEPROM). EEPROM is like a miniature laboratory on a tiny chip. The data is programmed into the chip using chemical and electrical properties of the materials used. The data is erased using the same method. Secure USB drives utilize cryptography to scramble the data stored on the drive, making it difficult to read.

Voice over Internet Protocol

The Internet has made it possible to dispense with traditional phone hardware. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a technology that digitizes the human voice and sends over the Internet. VoIP can eliminate the need for wired phone services completely in some cases. All the business needs is a reliable and secure Internet connection. They can use VoIP-enabled phones to enhance their business model. A business model that uses VoIP can be completely decentralized, allowing its employees to work from home. VoIP makes telecommuting the watchword of today's business world.

Accounting Software

Business finance is a key focus of every business, especially small start-ups. Small businesses can experience wild swings in profitability from year to year and even from month to month. Accounting software can obviate the need for paper-based systems and save the business money. Best of all, most quality accounting software is free of charge. Using accounting software removes most of the headaches associated with accounting. The software can automatically keep careful track of inventories, expenses, payrolls and profits. The best software can alert employees or the owner when something changes. These three technologies continue to change how business is done.