In today’s world, Warren, Ohio companies need dependable Internet access. It is the lifeblood of their company. Fortune 500 companies to small companies and everything in between, depend on reliable and fast Internet access.
Internet access will become increasingly essential to us in the coming months and years. Our dependence on access to The net will only grow as time goes on.
From email messaging to information sharing, e-commerce to archiving data, and voice over IP to video chat, the web is omnipresent. How can your needs be met? Is a cable modem enough? Metro Ethernet may be the thing you need. You may need Gigabit Internet. Does your Warren business need a 5 Meg Internet circuit, 10 Meg access to The web, a 50 Meg circuit, or a 100 Meg Internet access point?
You must, before selecting a service, assess the actual needs of your business. Is the internet only used for web surfing and email? Is it used for real-time data connection with cloud servers? Are you hosting data in Warren? Do remote locations rely upon you?
Have you thought about what will happen to your organization if your high-speed Internet is interrupted by an outage? How will the downtime affect your organization? How much uptime is essential to your organization? Prior to making any purchases, you must determine the answers to these questions.
Speaking broadly, all companies need high-speed access to the internet. Before you choose your broadband, look at the costs and benefits. Performing this analysis is an important step in picking the right one for your organization. Don’t be distracted by terminology. While you may hear providers throw out words and phrases like:
… the actual issue is knowing what technology and capability can satisfy your needs.
For most companies in Warren, Ohio, some or all of the employees need access to the net. Whether it is to communicate with shippers, do research or place orders, Internet access is required.
The number of workers you have may be the factor that drives your decision. If you have a handful of employees, a 5 or 10 Meg Internet circuit may be sufficient. If you have 50 employees who are using the internet simultaneously, you may need more.
Your workforce may simply use an intranet system with limited video and graphics. If this is true, your need for high speed Internet be less than you thought. When employees are often downloading images, videos and documents, however, the need for speed increases significantly.
Are you performing routine backups? Simultaneous connections to the web, which you need in order to sync your backup data, require support. If you conduct remote backups from every workstation, which you definitely should, this will be important.
Does your company require employees to share files using a service like Google drive or DropBox? The saved files go to the cloud and are then synchronized or “shared” with other people’s computers. Running all your services properly, including sharing files, requires that you have the right amount of bandwidth.
Your company location may cause you to think about high-speed business Internet access such as Metro Ethernet and/or gigabit Internet. “Lit buildings” that have already been wired by a carrier, are commonly the site for these. Installing high-speed Internet may not be as difficult and expensive as you think.
Absent the need to introduce Metro Ethernet into a new building, it is not particularly costly to connect Metro Ethernet to a suite or office within that building. Also, securing high-speed access to The net using gigabit Internet or Metro Ethernet often takes less than 30 days, depending on its availability.
Does your company host its own servers? Does your company use the hosted servers to run data feeds, APIs or websites for offices or businesses located elsewhere? Is your main business office with a hosted application accessed by 40 or even 50 branch office sites? Is your organization retail? Do you have thousands of stores? Do you host the point of sale system for the entire chain? Does your legal practice host all of the data for 3, 4 or 5 offices in different places?
If your company hosts its programs and information at a central location, people outside of that location need to have access in order to conduct organization. If your Internet connection goes down, those people are unable to work. When deciding on the right intranet solution for your business, ask yourself: Is the solution going to adequately support simultaneous and multiple connections from my different locations?
A cable modem or fairly cheap 10-megabyte circuit may be enough in certain scenarios. For example, these may meet the needs of a single office surfing the web. Metro Ethernet, gigabit Ethernet or other high-speed dedicated circuits is advisable for the headquarters where high-speed Internet access is important. High-speed alone is not enough. They must also need to be capable of supporting many diverse connections. The support you need could not be provided by a cable modem.
In many scenarios, bringing in an inexpensive circuit, such as a cable modem, comes at a price. You may save money on your monthly bill but the bandwidth you get must be shared among many people. While you may subscribe to a cable modem with a 30 Meg connection, you may be unable to reach those speeds during peak hours. Only a certain amount of bandwidth may be available in a community. Many cable companies have limits on the amount they can deliver. Different buildings and tenants housed or working within those buildings all share that set amount of bandwidth. While you may be capped at thirty-megabyte speed, will you ever reach that speed during organization hours? Is it a problem if you get a quarter or even half of the speed you expected?
Other providers do offer dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth. In this situation, your bandwidth is not shared but is fully allocated to your business. The full capacity of your circuit should be attainable during all hours regardless of neighboring buildings, people or offices.
With Metro Ethernet, for example, you can receive a guaranteed bandwidth in various increments including 5 and 10 Meg circuits, and 50 and 100 Meg circuits. In your office out to the web you can reach gigabit speeds with gigabit providers
Providers in these situations deliver enough to cover everyone’s needs. The providers divide their circuit to various tenants while guaranteeing that everyone gets their contracted speed.
Circuits can go down in Warren, Ohio even though certain providers offer superior Internet bandwidth products. You must ask yourself: “how do I lessen the chance of an outage? ”
Try using redundant circuits.
There are two types of redundancy to consider.
The first type exists when the same carrier gives you multiple circuits. This provides some protection when there are certain failures. Multiple circuits can help for example, when there is a physical line issue or a problem with a router port. However, if that carrier has a greater outage to your entire region or there is a line damaged outside of your office building, you may have both or all circuits go down. This is not foolproof, but does offer some protection.
Bringing in circuits using two distinct providers is the second form of circuit redundancy. You may want your circuits to appear and act as if they are one and come from the same source. If so you can use IP address allocations and advanced routers to do so. In reality, they are completely separate and redundant to each other. You will get more substantial protection from this diversity redundancy. If one carrier has a problem, the other likely will not.
You should look for redundant circuits from carriers in Warren that do not have the same physical geographic pathways, in order to get the most redundancy. This means that you should try to have the circuits come into you building from different sides. Whether they are attached underground or to a telephone pole, your goal should be to have the circuits in different directions leading to different central places. By doing this, if there is a significant problem such as a fire at a data center, you have redundancy in an alternative physical direction.
The cost to your company if you do not have reliable Internet access will be far greater than you may realize. Consider the following:
You are on a cable modem with the carrier providing circuits to 14 other tenants in your building. Between 9 and 5, any of those other offices could be downloading huge files, streaming video or taking large volume of phone calls and more. As the amount of accessible bandwidth decreases, what happens to your needs? What happens to your phone calls? How will it affect the quality of that telephone call? Are the calls going to be dropped? Will they be full of static?
You may be an accounting firm that shares databases, a retail chain company utilizing a point of sale system or a law practice sharing files. Regardless of the specifics, your office is the hub for your enterprise. Your primary Internet connection is responsible for granting access to data to all of your locations. This is true whether you have 3 sites or 2000 places. What happens if your circuit crashes? Is it just irritating? Is it going to cause tremendous problems? Can meaningful work be conducted at your remote offices? What happens to new orders? Can they be taken or processed? Dispense and receive data? Make sure you completely understand your needs before you pick a solution. What if you are a software company? Perhaps you are running a hosted solution and it must be used by multiple customers; maybe even hundreds. You operate a service that utilizes API in order to grant access to other systems. They may use this to collect whatever data you are offering such as commodity prices, weather data or freight calculations. What happens when there is a problem connecting to your servers? Customers will only take so many repeated outages. How long with they remain with your company?
What if your company could not function at all without the net? Maybe your business depends upon it completely. If your circuits go down, you cannot make calls. Your reps have no way of answering calls, if they even know they are coming in. Your business is basically done with. While many of the most reputable call centers are already aware and using the advantages of redundancy, is it sufficiently meeting their needs? Are your providers sufficiently reliable? Is the quality of service sufficient? Are your calls clear and reliable?
You have several different options to pick from. Your decision will be based on different factors including your organization needs and your budget. Essentially:
If you are a small company, with just one location and not concerned about redundancy, a single five meg, 10 meg or 50 meg Internet access circuit may be sufficient. Gigabit service and Metro Ethernet options seem expensive. If you are in a lit building, however, they can be less than you think. Look into it. Prices change based on your location and the availability of circuits. Please speak with our engineers about what options best suit your needs.
If you have a midsized business in Warren, you will need higher-speed access to The net. Your choices include: Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet or other high-speed circuits. Optimally, multiple providers and multiple circuits will give you the most redundancy. You may be able to achieve this in a manner that will not break the bank. Using one 100-megabyte circuit instead of two 50-megabyte circuits, is one example. Remember, costs vary. So does availability. Learn your options by speaking with one of our knowledgeable experts. We can help you determine what is available in your specific location.
Businesses with many sites face the greatest risk for failure. Redundant circuits are a necessity. It is helpful if they use multiple providers. In addition, consider redundant equipment. Redundant routers and switches can minimize risk also. Take a careful look at Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers and gigabit Internet providers. Research other high-speed Internet access circuit providers also and make an informed decision. The right mix can help. If you can figure out the best combination of carriers and services for your business, you will benefit.
To run efficiently and effectively, corporations and businesses that fall into this category must use point-to-point high-speed Internet circuits, gigabit Internet circuits and Metro Ethernet circuits. You will want to have the greatest protection of your uptime. To accomplish this you must have redundancy: redundant circuits from multiple carriers and redundant hardware for your system. The last thing you want is interruptions or slowdowns affecting your organization. You must provide enough bandwidth to avoid these pitfalls that sometimes occur during sudden usage spikes. Your circuits and hardware must be able to support a large number of fast and simultaneous connections.
Do not risk having failing circuits or not enough bandwidth. It is imperative that the circuit or circuits you choose meet your needs but also keep you within your allowable budget. There is tremendous pressure on you to choose the best combination of circuits and hardware.
Our engineers will take the pressure off and develop a free action plan for you by analyzing your needs. You want your organization to run smoothly. We will look at your current usage levels and demand levels and design a plan that meets your needs at a cost that makes sense for you.
An appointment for an assessment can be made by calling our office or clicking here to complete the contact form on the side of this page. It can take as little as 48 hours to provide a complete assessment.