How A Lack Of Failover Broadband Can Impact Your Business

by | May 3, 2022 | Business Broadband, Failover Broadband

As a society, we have become increasingly dependent on the internet.

For businesses, a secure and reliable connection to the internet is now a necessity for the day to day running of their enterprise. Whether your business is a small café, a busy chain of pharmacies or a large scale company, the need for strong and stable broadband is vital, even more so in a post-pandemic landscape.

With operational infrastructures including emails, VoIP phones, file management and POS systems, as well as CRM and team collaboration tools all reliant on an internet connection, have you considered how your business would cope with an outage?

In this article, we are going to take a look at the impact a loss of internet connection can have on your business and what the solution is – Failover Broadband.

The cost of Internet downtime to your business

Internet outages happen regardless of the type of broadband connection you may have. Loss of connection at some point is inevitable for many reasons, be that due to a natural disaster, power outage, cyber-attack or network maintenance.

When this happens, it can be detrimental to your business.

Here are some of the ways that an internet outage can affect your business:

Lost revenue

If your network goes down and payments and orders cannot be processed, then your revenue will take a direct hit. Time is money, and for every moment of downtime, more sales are lost.

Customers may not want to wait around until you’re back up and running, which gives them the opportunity to change their minds or look for the same product or service from one of your competitors.

Issues with syncing data

Most businesses nowadays operate a cloud-based system or at least a hybrid version. These applications, which are commonly integrated with multiple systems, are heavily reliant on the Internet and will not sync in the event of an outage.

This can result in a breakdown of operations either completely or partially meaning work and data can be lost, business continuity is affected and recovery is more complex.

Develops into problems with communication

Maintaining communication with customers and employees is a key factor in operating your business. A network outage can result in a breakdown of communications which in turn will have a negative impact on the provision of customer service and the collaboration between teams or departments of the business.

Inconvenience for customers

In this busy world, customers know what they want and when they want it. If a network outage causes an inconvenience to customers in any way or if they have a poor experience as a result, then you could be at great risk of losing those customers, and your hard-earned reputation with it.

Demonstrates lack of professionalism to customers and employees

When businesses experience downtime, this can exhibit a lack of professionalism, both for customers and employees.

From a customer perspective, the expectation of businesses to have a backup plan in the event of something going wrong shows good management and instils trust. When that backup plan is not in place, it can sound alarm bells for customers.

From an employee’s point of view, issues with the network impact their ability to do their job efficiently. This may lead to a lack of confidence in the company resulting in a higher attrition rate.

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Increased risk of cyber attack

A loss of internet connection can send unprepared businesses into a frenzied panic. In such a scenario, many will look for the quickest solution, which may be to connect to an unsecured public WiFi network for instance. Or, you may find employees opting to use their own devices or networks to reconnect and get things back up and running.

Opting for either of these alternatives, however, even if just for the briefest time, can open the business up to the risk of cyber-attack or data breach. In the long run, this could prove more costly than a period of downtime for your business.

Damage to reputation

As mentioned earlier, reputational damage is perhaps one of the most serious consequences of an unexpected outage. As the saying goes, if you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail.

By failing to put a plan in place for any situation that can negatively impact your business and your customers, you are failing the people who rely on you – if they cannot trust you to solve their problem, they will find someone else who can.

In an age when unhappy customers can take to social media or online review websites, the word can spread rapidly of a poorly run and unreliable business. According to a survey conducted by PWC, one in three consumers will walk away from a brand after just one bad experience.

Reputations can take years to build up and only moments to destroy.

So what’s the good news? Well, fortunately, there is a solution – Failover Broadband.

What is Failover Broadband?

Failover Broadband, which we previously discussed in this article, is a backup network or secondary source of internet connection that can be activated and used in the event of an outage of the primary source.

If an interruption or loss of connection occurs, then an independent secondary failover link will automatically take over as the main internet connection, avoiding any downtime.

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The benefits of having Failover Broadband in place

Now that we have looked at the risks of not having Failover Broadband, let’s examine the benefits that having this backup network can offer businesses:

Ensures business continuity

Businesses can reduce and even eliminate the periods of downtime when there’s a backup network connection in place, which means that the chances of losing out on sales and revenue are greatly reduced.

Failover broadband will actually save money for your business, as the cost of this service is far less than the potential financial costs involved in a serious outage, not to mention the potential reputational cost.

Maintains excellent customer service

Having a backup network connection allows businesses to keep communication channels open with customers when there is a loss of network.

Not only does this demonstrate trust and reliability to your customers, but it also means that customers can expect the same level of service and products 24/7.

Encourages positive team morale

In the event of network downtime, the workplace can become a stressful environment, as employees scramble to resolve the issue. With failover broadband installed as a backup, you eliminate this scenario, allowing your team members to focus on their own job without having to drop tools and sort out the network issue.

All in all, this instils a positive and supportive environment in the workplace, which leads to greater job satisfaction.

Conclusion – Failover Broadband is the Solution

While broadband outages are unavoidable, businesses can take the necessary steps to ensure that, in such an event, they have a backup plan.

At a time when business operations are so dependent on the internet, opting for Failover Broadband truly is a no brainer in 2022.

One Contact can provide fully monitored Failover Broadband so you can rest assured that your business is live and online 24/7.

The combination of our reliable Failover Broadband and our strong, stable and secure Business Broadband provides the ultimate platform to do business in 2022 and beyond – without any costly outages or missed sales.

Get in touch with us today to ensure your business continuity is preserved and protected.

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