Case Study: Transforming a Vancouver Business Through IT Strategy
Case study · Vancouver retail-services business
An 11-person Vancouver retail-services business asked for help with “the website is slow.” The website was the visible symptom of a tangled IT setup — five overlapping SaaS tools, no documented backup process, MFA half-installed, and a US-based shared host with a ballooning renewal. This is the IT-strategy engagement that fixed it.
Situation
The owner could name nine of the eleven SaaS tools they were paying for. The website was on a US shared host with a 4× renewal jump. Backups were “in there somewhere.” MFA was on the owner’s account; nobody else’s. The business was growing despite the chaos, not because of it.
The 1-page IT strategy
Centralize identity in Microsoft 365. MFA on every account.
Operating cadence: 30-minute monthly review with the owner.
~$340Monthly SaaS savings
-78%Time-to-First-Byte (1.1 s → 240 ms)
100%MFA coverage
5 hrsPer-week leadership time recovered
Good IT consulting is fewer slides, fewer surprises, and a roadmap you can actually read.
Hosting plans
Website hosting plans
Current Metro Vancouver IT hosting plans with secure checkout. Pricing and purchase buttons are shared with the main pricing page.
Starter
Small sites and personal projects
$5CAD / month · or $60 / year
Storage: 5 GB NVMe
Bandwidth: 50 GB/mo
CDN Cloudflare & WAF protected
Free SSL + HTTP/2
Daily off-site backups (30-day retention)
Uptime monitoring & email alerts
SiteWorx access
One-click app installer (Softaculous)
Most popular
Standard
Growing businesses and marketing sites
$15CAD / month · or $180 / year
Storage: 15 GB NVMe
Bandwidth: 200 GB/mo
CDN Cloudflare & WAF protected
Free SSL + HTTP/2
Daily off-site backups (30-day retention)
Uptime monitoring & email alerts
SiteWorx access
One-click app installer (Softaculous)
Email deliverability setup (SPF, DKIM)
Pro
Heavier sites and regulated workloads
$35CAD / month · or $420 / year
Storage: 40 GB NVMe
Bandwidth: 500 GB/mo
CDN Cloudflare & WAF protected
Free SSL + HTTP/2
Daily off-site backups (30-day retention)
Uptime monitoring & email alerts
SiteWorx access
One-click app installer (Softaculous)
Email deliverability setup (SPF, DKIM)
Advanced WAF rules management
Priority support & incident response
Twelve months later
Metric
Before
After 12 months
Site uptime
~98.9%
~99.95%
Time-to-First-Byte
~1.1 s
~240 ms
MFA coverage
~25%
100%
SaaS apps
11
7
Monthly IT cost
~$1,810
~$1,250
Security incidents
1 close call
0
Local Vancouver IT support is the difference between “ticket #492 in queue” and “fixed before lunch.”
Lessons that travel
The website is rarely the deepest problem. It is usually the symptom.
Retiring tools is the cheapest, fastest IT savings move available to small businesses.
Local hosting + a calm cybersecurity baseline + a 30-minute monthly review compounds.
You don’t have to do everything; you have to do the right three things, in the right order.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need an in-house IT person, or is a Vancouver IT consultant enough?
For most Vancouver small businesses (under 30 staff), a fractional IT consulting relationship is far cheaper and far more effective than hiring. You get strategy, vendor management, security, and on-demand support without the full-time payroll. See our IT consulting service.
How long does an IT consulting engagement usually last?
Most engagements are open-ended monthly relationships with a two-week trial. Project-based engagements (cloud migration, security hardening, website rebuild) run from 2 to 8 weeks depending on scope.
Do you work with our existing tools, or do we have to switch everything?
We work with what you have first — Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, QuickBooks, HubSpot, your existing host. We only recommend changes when the cost-benefit is clear and documented.
Do you support remote and hybrid Vancouver teams?
Yes — most of our clients are hybrid or fully remote. We focus heavily on identity, secure access, device hygiene, and cloud-first collaboration so that remote work is safe and fast.
How fast can you respond when something breaks?
Same-business-day response on every plan. Critical-impact tickets (site down, suspected breach) get priority and a real human in your time zone, not a ticket queue offshore.
Want a similar 1-page IT strategy for your Vancouver business?
30-minute call. We will pick the three highest-leverage moves and tell you which projects to leave alone.
