Our world has many points of connectivity. Finding the right solution for your business requires an understanding of what you are trying to achieve, not what you have always been doing, and especially not what others are doing.
Your organisations’ requirements are unique in many ways. Your locations, what your staff require connectivity for, what your organisations’ infrastructure needs to deliver, and so on. As such, you need to develop and deliver a solution that works for you, your organisation, your ecosystem, and quintessentially, your required business outcomes.
The Scope of Connectivity:
Connectivity solutions range from DSL (yes, there is still a lot of copper around), NBN, 4G, Fibre Ethernet all the way up to Dark Fibre. What is right for one business outcome, may well be not the same for another business outcome. Furthermore, there are different grades and features of all the solutions when you drill them down.
So, what do I need to be aware of?
The most important factors to understand when looking at your options are the following:
- What connectivity technology is available at the locations required?
- How many users shall be connected to this?
- What are you using this connectivity for? Is it purely internet, scheduled back-ups, VOIP?
- What is important for your internal and external customer experience?
- What redundancies would be in place if the primary link were to go through unscheduled maintenance?
Also, be aware of these “Gotcha’s”:
Consumer Grade vs Business Grade:
Is it a business-grade connection or is it a consumer-grade connection? This really makes a difference when you have several users connecting to the internet and also, Service Level Agreements (SLA’s) that can be attached to the service. If you go for a consumer-grade connection, such as NBN TC4 (I shall go into the differences in a future blog), if the NBN connection goes down, then NBN shall apply a best-efforts mentality. As well, NBN TC4 (this is easily identified by speeds of 25/5 Mbps | 50/20 Mbps | 100/40 Mbps that you see being advertised) is really meant for household consumption. Not business consumption. With business-grade connections, in most cases, there is an SLA attached.
SLA’s:
Service Level Agreements are timelines when issues are looked at or resolved. There is a big discrepancy here that you need to be aware of. An SLA may say a response time of 4 hours. What that means is that the carrier, whoever it maybe, is contracted to respond to you within 4 hours to say that they are aware of the issue. This does not mean resolution. The higher the SLA (especially resolution vs. response time), the higher the support price. What most organisations need to do is to weigh up the SLA vs the cost to the business.
Contract Terms:
Nearly all connectivity solutions come with a minimum fixed contract term. This is extremely important if you are looking at a temporary connectivity solution, or if you are looking to move offices, etc. Be aware that there are early termination fees (ETF) for exiting a contract early.
Customer Premise Equipment (CPE):
What is customer premise equipment? This term is an all-encompassing term used by Telecommunications providers. Basically, it just means the router that connects to the internet/connection. If you are changing your connectivity, in most cases you are going to need to upgrade your equipment (i.e., your router). Depending on the technology you are implementing, the costs can run into the thousands to make sure you get the most out of your connection.
Ok. I have answered and understand the above. What next?
We are here to guide you through the process and provide the right solution for your organisation. We have provided connectivity solutions for challenging, distributed environments, such as construction organisations.
Netier goes through the below process to ensure we deliver what is fit for purpose, and meets the standards that you are looking for:
- Understanding your exact requirements.
- Verifying the technologies available from different carriers at the requested locations.
- Provide you with advice on what solution shall be the best fit for you.
- Provide you with pricing and all potential upfront costs that you may encounter.
- Project manage the install of the connectivity service and make sure that your organisation is up and running as quickly as possible on the right connectivity solution.
I am convinced!
Great. Give us a call on 1300 638 437 or send us an email to sales@netier.com.au, and let us help you achieve your business outcomes through connectivity.
Contact Us
For more information, call us on 1300 638 437 and one of the team will be happy to assist. Alternatively, email sales@netier.com.au and a Netier team member will get back to you as soon as possible.
