Most businesses in today’s advanced world breathe and live on the internet. Ranging from doing minute tasks to the most tiresome, the empires of various business people thrive with a secure and fast internet connection.
But why is it so important to have a backup/failover Internet?
Companies going head-to-head in various niches depend on digital efficiency in bringing in most of their income and staying on top. The competitive nature of these big businesses is a force to be reckoned with.
Hence, having a failover Internet line could save you money, build loyal customers since you’re always quick and on time with their demands, and eliminate downtime for complete productivity.
But can you imagine what happens when a big-shot company loses its connection for even an hour?
You lose the trust of customers who expects quick results from you, and failure to provide this simple yet agonizing function could lead to abnormal losses. We’re talking in the thousands or even millions of dollars.
So if you’re wondering about the importance of a backup/failover internet connection and pondering if you need such a thing, then the answer is a big yes!
You can easily avoid this obstacle by simply having a secondary connection, also known as backup/failover internet. Start protecting your business today and always stay on top of the game.
This article covers everything you need to know and understand about backup/failover internet for your growing business. Let’s get started!
What Is Backup Internet?
The perfect solution for an internet outage is to have a backup Internet line. Businesses thrive on continuity, and the Internet plays a significant part in making this possible.
In simple words, backup internet is a safety net if you’re met with an internet outage on your main connection.
Even if you could find the perfect service provider for your company that provides almost 100% uptime, there will always be instances when the connection goes down for a period of time due to some unforeseen event.
Your company could cause the issue by accidentally disconnecting the connection or by an unexpected error on your service provider’s part due to natural disasters like tornadoes, which are risks you shouldn’t be taking.
Outages pose an extreme threat to your thriving businesses. Depending on what is causing the issue, it could take minutes to hours, or even days to get it back up, resulting in downtime costing you thousands of dollars and even millions.
In the meantime, productivity goes down the drain, and wasting even minutes is crucial when playing at a high-level competitive stage. In the worst-case scenario, your competition could be getting your customers.
You can prevent this by having a secondary connection or backup Internet line if your company relies on the internet. The failover or backup Internet line would kick in as soon as your main line goes down during an outage.
The failover Internet gets connected as soon as your primary connection cuts off, ensuring you don’t lose productivity, time, and money. It’s important to understand how beneficial it can be for your business to have a second connection it can rely on during a time of need.
Cost Of Downtime
What is downtime? Downtime is when you cannot work as a company due to malfunctioning machines, technical failures, or in this case, an outage of the Internet.
You lose time, reputation, productivity, and money, among many other things, as a company during downtime.
Nowadays, every company and business is linked to the Internet in some form or another. If your business falls into this category, the cost of downtime is not to be taken lightly.
Since you need the Internet to interact with customers, utilize email, and any web-based applications, it’s important to ensure downtime doesn’t affect your business and staff.
There are also cases where your company’s phones are connected to the internet, so having an outage can lead to phone service downtime since your customers would not be able to reach you which can lead to losses.
Here are some of the general costs of downtime:
- Hidden costs – These are the extra expenses caused by the outage, including paying the repair man his rate and completing orders set by the customers, among other things. Some more hidden costs include building bills like (security, AC, lights, etc.) during a loss.
- Loss of sales – An outage can impact your company’s ability to make sales, causing losses of potential and current customers.
- Owing money – An hour of downtime could lead to various unhappy customers and situations where they would want to be compensated for their time and money wastage by the company.
- A damaged reputation – Reputation is a long work in progress and can easily be destroyed in as short as an hour or two. Always being prepared to save the company’s reputation is critical to success.
- Productivity of stuff – You’re paying your staff to be productive, but since they need the internet connection and you happen to have an outage, you will still end up paying them for hours spent in the office doing nothing.
Some of the world’s biggest companies, like Amazon, sometimes face outages. However, for a billion-dollar company to dish out a few million dollars lost in hours is less harsh than for small companies.
Start-ups and small companies usually have more to lose than big ones since you spend more than you earn, your start-up reputation is on the line, customer trust is still in progress, and you might risk tragic losses with all the additional costs.
Having a safety net to rely on by paying a few additional costs for a secondary Internet will save you more money than you would spend in case of downtime.
Besides, an outage is a frequent phenomenon that occurs to the best of businesses, and you can’t just risk the company you’ve worked so hard for to face such a scenario.
Things That May Cause Downtime/Internet Service To Fail
While a variety of situations can end up causing downtime/Internet service to fail, here are some common culprits that are usually the reason behind this:
Human And Building Error
Your business could face a downtime/Internet service failure due to a power cut within the building or find yourself dealing with a faulty machine or equipment during a highly productive day. This can cause quite a fuss, but power cuts generally are fixed immediately, so it doesn’t pose much threat. But machines, on the other hand, may take hours to several days to get fixed.
Also, human error occurs when staff accidentally cause downtime/Internet service failure by not following proper equipment procedures. This is usually a build-up of errors and, in the end, causes damages that can lead to adequate losses.
Provider Issues
As mentioned, your Internet service provider could be facing some out-of-hand problems that can cause an outage or cause slow internet. This is highly common since the disturbance of natural phenomena like earthquakes, floods, storms, etc., or error on their part is inevitable.
However, it can take minutes to hours to a whole day to get it fixed based on the damages causing you unimaginable downtime. A safety net like a secondary internet can free you from this problem.
Cyber-Attacks Pose A Threat
Another leading cause of downtime/Internet failure is caused by cyber attackers who tend to ruin lives. They will try to access your computers on the hunt for various data or damage them by leaving malicious software that makes operating systems crash.
76% of global companies are victims of cyber attacks and have faced tragic downtime in the past year. However, you can keep your businesses safe from it by performing various tasks.
Tasks that involve avoiding using location services and often changing privacy settings, keeping passwords filled with upper and lower cases, keeping your software up-to-date, and using firewalls and antivirus.
Overloaded Network
Another common issue some big businesses face is an overloaded network, which can be challenging if left unchecked. This happens when too many devices are connected to one network without proper upgrades that lets you handle more data.
You can either face a slow network response or see everything crash before your eyes and be involved with a considerable downtime.
To avoid downtime by the overloaded network issue, you should ensure that you have regular maintenance checks that can help you detect problems or avoid hardware and software failures before they happen by upgrading your systems when needed.
Outdated Equipment Might Be At Fault
In most cases, downtime caused by outdated equipment is the fault of the one who oversees the operation of businesses. But it could also be caused due to it being old.
Having faulty or outdated equipment on a busy day could cause minimal losses or downtime for your business.
If you’re lucky enough, replacing machines or equipment shouldn’t break the bank and can be fixed or replaced soon. However, it could also take several days and cost you more than you bargained for.
A regular maintenance check can quickly help you avoid this problem and save you from immeasurable loss.
Options For Backup Internet
You can choose from several options for your backup/failover Internet, but certain conditions may apply. One is the office’s location; the other is if the backup internet is a good choice for your budget, the reliability, and speed of your backup service provider, how well they treat their customers, etc.
Here are some of the best backup Internet options you can choose for a successful business:
Fiber
Fiber-optics are extremely fast, reliable, and a top choice among business owners hence it is considered one of the best. Unlike other failover Internet options, they break out from the traditional copper wire and use a cable that contains plastic fibers (Thin Glass) that gives it an edge over other connections, and the speed is unmatched.
There are three types of Fiber Internet, and FTTP/FTTH is the fastest of them all. However, Fiber optics are priced much higher than your usual connection, and you might only get your hands on them if you live close to major cities.
Although, if Fiber-optic is available in your area, it may be a great asset to your office or business since the speed is worth every penny, and you will face little to no issues once you get it fixed up as your failover Internet.
Cable
An excellent secondary failover Internet option you can take for your business is Cable. Since it operates on the same copper cable lines that provide cable TV, it is readily available in any area that supports a TV connection.
Cable offers a fast and reliable connection, better than most, and is less prone to outages caused by storms. You can choose from various providers; luckily, the packages are budget-friendly, so it’s a win-win situation.
However, the speed may vary depending on how much you pay, so the faster the connection, the more you’ll have to pay.
Wireless
4G, 5G, and satellite backup internet come under wireless connections, but the latter is entirely different from the other two.
While 4G and 5G connections are excellent failover Internet connections for businesses and offices, most people don’t know they can be amazingly useful in preventing downtime. The modems use the same connections as your mobile network, so you’ll still get speedy Internet regardless of any remote areas.
On the other hand, satellite providers use a satellite’s signal to send Internet connections to their users. They usually cover a far superior range than most connections, so if you run your business far from big cities, this might be a good failover connection.
Moreover, most people hated the poor connection it sent out back in the day, but with the advancement of technology, they have upped their game, and you can now enjoy a speedy internet connection but with a slightly higher price range than most.
Wrapping up
We hope this article answers all your queries and helps you choose the best backup/failover Internet connection for your business. If you need help setting up a backup or failover Internet connection for your business, contact Pennyrile Technologies for a free consultation and make your business safe from unexpected downtime.
