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Serving Columbus, OH since 2003

Managed IT Advisor for Columbus, Ohio

we are not an MSP. we are the advisor who picks the right outsourced IT or co-managed partner for you, reads the contract, and stays in the seat when something breaks. The partner runs the helpdesk. we handle you. 23 years. Vendor-neutral.

Buckeye Telecom Inc., Columbus, OH614-224-2003jeubanks@buckeyetelecom.com
Most Columbus IT firms handle IT but outsource phones to a carrier. Most carriers handle phones but never touch IT. That split creates expensive gaps, finger-pointing during outages, mismatched contracts, and decisions made by people who do not see the whole picture. I do it differently. I started in 2003 as a telecom carrier broker. I added IT and security to what I procure as my clients asked for it. Today I sit in one seat for all of it: the carriers, the helpdesk partner, the MDR partner, the cloud and phone partners. One contract. One invoice. One number to call when something goes wrong.
23 Years
Operating in Ohio
500+
Ohio businesses served
One Roof
IT, security, phone, network
Vendor-Neutral
No house brand to push

Why Columbus Mid-Market Companies Need Both Under One Roof

Finger-Pointing During Outages

When phones go down, your MSP blames the carrier. The carrier blames the MSP. You sit on hold while customers cannot reach you.

Multiple Monthly Invoices

One bill for IT support, one for cybersecurity, one for internet, one for phones, one for the SD-WAN, one for compliance. No one is looking at total cost.

Mismatched Contracts

Your IT contract renews in March, the carrier in September, the security tool in December. Nothing aligns. Nothing gets optimized.

Decisions Made in Silos

Your MSP recommends a cloud migration. Your carrier sells you bandwidth that does not match. Your security vendor flags risks no one resolves.

Higher Total Cost

Three vendors with overlapping tools, duplicated licensing, and no one negotiating across the whole stack. Mid-market companies routinely overpay 20–30% under this model.

No Strategic Owner

Nobody is accountable for the whole technology picture. Your team plays integrator on top of running the business.

Most IT firms push their own stack. we work with every major carrier, phone platform, firewall vendor, and cloud provider and pick the right one for your environment. After 23 years we know which decisions age well and which do not. That is what we bring to the seat.

How We Work: Evaluate. Decide. Manage.

1

Evaluate

we audit your IT environment, your phone system, your carrier contracts, your security posture, and your spend, benchmarked against what mid-market peers pay.

2

Decide

we help you choose the right carriers, vendors, and contracts, vendor-neutral. we negotiate alongside you. We document why each decision was made.

3

Manage

Once you have made the right decision, we run it. 24/7 monitoring, helpdesk, security, phone administration, and renewal advisory, under one accountable team.

What We Evaluate, Decide On, and Manage for You

Helpdesk & End-User Support

Live helpdesk for your Columbus team. Microsoft 365 management. Password resets, hardware support, onboarding, and offboarding. More on managed IT →

Cybersecurity & 24/7 SOC

Next-gen firewall, MDR, MFA, endpoint protection, and email security. Compliance support for HIPAA, PCI, SOC 2, CMMC. More on managed security →

Hosted Business Phone (VoIP & UCaaS)

Cloud phone system with mobile app, SMS, video, auto-attendant, and call recording. One number rings every device. More on hosted VoIP →

Network & SD-WAN

Multi-site connectivity, automatic failover, application prioritization, and centralized management. More on SD-WAN →

Cloud & Data Center

Microsoft 365, Azure, hybrid cloud, colocation, and disaster recovery. We design what fits the workload. More on data center & cloud →

Compliance & vCIO

HIPAA, PCI-DSS, SOC 2, and CMMC alignment. Quarterly technology reviews and 3-year roadmaps. We sit in for the IT executive role you do not have on staff.

What This Costs (and How I Am Paid)

Pricing depends on your size, what you have today, and what you actually need. The partners we place bill you direct at their standard rates — the same rates you would pay walking in to them yourself. The difference: we do the homework, negotiate the contracts, and sit in for the renewals. You pay me nothing for any of that.

100% of my revenue is carrier and supplier residuals. The partner pays Buckeye when you sign with them. Same price you would pay direct — with me in your corner for procurement and oversight.

For a 50-user Columbus mid-market business, expect to spend less consolidating through one advisor than running 3 or 4 vendors yourself. I can put real partner quotes in front of you in 5 business days once I see your stack.

Read the full compensation disclosure →

Convergence Case Study · Hosted VoIP + Telecom Audit

Columbus Law Group Saved $50,400 Annually After Switching to Convergence

An 85-attorney Columbus law firm was paying separate vendors for their phone system, internet, and IT support. We audited the carrier contracts, replaced their aging PBX with hosted VoIP, eliminated unused lines, and consolidated everything onto one monthly invoice, saving $4,200 per month and reducing four vendor relationships to one.

Read the full case study →

Data Center, Cloud & Disaster Recovery for Columbus Businesses

Most Columbus mid-market companies are running a mix of on-premise hardware, Microsoft 365, and an Azure or AWS footprint that grew without a plan. we help you make sense of it, and then we run it.

Our data center and cloud practice covers the full stack of what mid-market Ohio businesses need: colocation in carrier-neutral facilities (we partner with the major Columbus and Central Ohio data centers so you’re not locked into a single provider), hybrid cloud architecture across Azure, AWS, and private infrastructure, Microsoft 365 advanced configuration and migration (Exchange, Teams, SharePoint, Intune, Purview), disaster recovery and business continuity planning with documented RTO/RPO targets that match your actual business risk, and backup architecture, immutable backups, 3-2-1 verified, ransomware-resistant by design.

The colocation and cloud partners we place commit to a 99.99% uptime SLA documented in your contract with them, and they test DR plans quarterly with real failover drills, not paper exercises. If you have never tested your backups by actually restoring something, you do not have a backup. You have hope. I make sure the partner replaces the hope with proof.

For Columbus businesses currently running aging on-prem servers, paying for cloud capacity they don’t use, or carrying a DR plan that hasn’t been tested in two years, this is the conversation we have most often. The audit is free, the recommendation is vendor-neutral, and the math usually works in your favor.

Telecom Expense Management & Bill Audit

Telecom expense management (TEM) is the unsexy practice of reading every line of your carrier invoices and asking why are we paying for this? After 23 years auditing Columbus and Ohio business telecom contracts, we can tell you: most companies are paying for things they don’t use, at rates that haven’t been renegotiated since the contract was signed.

Our TEM engagements typically uncover three categories of waste: unused services (phone lines for employees who left two years ago, fax lines tied to retired workflows, circuits at closed locations), billing errors and contract drift (auto-renewed at non-promo rates, regulatory fees applied to lines that shouldn’t carry them, slammed services from carrier "optimization"), and over-provisioned bandwidth (the 1 Gbps fiber circuit you bought five years ago when prices were 3x current market).

Most clients save 20–35% on telecom in the first 90 days after a full audit with savings holding because we set up ongoing invoice review and renewal advisory, not a one-shot cleanup. The Free Bill Audit Checklist walks you through the process yourself if you want to start; or schedule a free Stack Audit with our team and we will do it for you.

We’re carrier-neutral, which matters more here than anywhere else. A carrier’s "TEM service" is a sales channel disguised as a cost-control service. Ours isn’t. We get paid by you to find waste, regardless of which carrier it benefits.

Everything Included Under One Engagement

When you bring us in for managed IT and business phone, you get one advisor in the seat for all of it — IT operations, security, telecom, and infrastructure. I pick the partners, I sign the carrier paperwork, we sit in for renewals, and we oversee every layer. Here is what a typical mid-market Columbus client gets, and which partner delivers which piece:

  • · 24/7 helpdesk for end-user support, phone, email, chat, ticket portal
  • · Managed security through the MDR partner we place — SOC monitoring, MDR, SIEM, EDR, threat hunting
  • · Managed WiFi (business Wi-Fi), secure managed Wi-Fi design, deployment, and operation across all locations
  • · Voice and data cabling, structured cabling, phone wiring, and installation for new builds, expansions, retrofits
  • · Hosted VoIP & UCaaS, cloud phone systems, mobile apps, contact center
  • · SD-WAN & multi-location networking across fiber, cable, LTE
  • · Data center, colocation, and cloud, hybrid Azure, M365, DR planning
  • · Cyber insurance readiness, controls and documentation that pass underwriting
  • · Compliance support, HIPAA, SOC 2, CMMC, PCI
  • · Telecom expense management, bill audit, contract renegotiation, ongoing review
  • · vCIO & strategy, quarterly reviews, 3-year roadmaps, budget planning
  • · Vendor management, one throat to choke for every carrier, vendor, platform

If you’ve been searching for an “MSP near me” in Columbus that handles all of this under one roof, this is the engagement that does it.

Industries We Serve in Columbus and Across Ohio

We work with mid-market businesses across Ohio, 50–5,000+ employees, 2+ locations, $10M–$250M revenue. Industry pages with named solutions:

Frequently Asked Questions

We already have an MSP, can you just handle our business phones?
Yes. The partners we place deploy and manage hosted VoIP, SD-WAN, and SIP services for Columbus businesses that already have an MSP. Many of our telecom-only engagements eventually grow into full convergence as our clients see how much smoother things run when one team owns both layers.
We already have a phone system, can you just handle our managed IT?
Yes. About a third of our clients start with managed IT only, then move telecom to us at their next contract renewal. we will not push you to switch, we will tell you whether your current phone system is a good fit and help you optimize either way.
What if we are under contract with our carrier or current MSP?
we start with a free audit of your contracts and run the math on early termination fees against the savings of moving. In most cases I time the transition to your renewal date so there are no penalties. we will tell you honestly when staying put is the right call.
Do you serve businesses outside Columbus?
Yes. We are headquartered in downtown Columbus and work with mid-market businesses across Ohio, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Dayton, Toledo, Akron, and the suburbs in between. Most of our managed services are delivered remotely with on-site support dispatched as needed.
How does pricing work? Is it cheaper than buying separately?
You pay one monthly invoice covering whichever services you take from us, IT, security, phone, network, cloud. There is no convergence premium. Most clients pay 15–30% less in year one than they did with separate vendors, primarily from eliminating duplicated tools, unused phone lines, and renegotiated carrier contracts.
We are a 25-person company, is this overkill?
I work best with Columbus and Ohio companies in the 50–5,000+ employee range, but we have plenty of clients on the smaller side. If you are under 25 employees, we will tell you whether we are the right fit or point you to a partner who is. No hard feelings.

Talk to an Advisor, 15-Minute Call, No Deck

Tell us what you have today, current MSP, phone system, carriers, what is not working. we will tell you whether convergence makes sense for your business or whether you are already optimized. No sales pressure. We have been doing this for 23 years.