Providing a great customer and employee experience is critical to the sustained growth of any business. Their loyalty to your business and your brand is largely influenced by their engagement, interactions, and overall experience. Today, more than ever employee and customer expectations have evolved and they require or expect intuitive, reliable, and fast services.

Customers who have a positive experience are more likely to become advocates of your brand and product or service. They will promote your business for you, in turn growing your brand awareness and ultimately boosting your revenue.

Employees who have a positive experience will likely be more engaged, which leads to a higher quality of work and productivity. Happy employees also equate to long-term employees ultimately reducing turnover and hiring costs.

Providing a great experience

To provide a great experience, you must make sure customer interactions are fast, convenient, and consistent. To create a positive working experience for employees, business owners need to provide the proper tools that allow them to complete their tasks efficiently.

To do this, your business technology plays a major role. Internet is the backbone of a company’s operations and having a fast, reliable Internet connection is required to accommodate the ever-evolving usage and service demands.

Let’s take a look at the impact a poor Internet connection can have on your employee and customer experiences.

The impact of poor Internet on employee experiences

End-user frustration: Employees need to be set up for success and businesses need to provide the tools necessary for them to perform their jobs efficiently. Studies suggest that the number one cause of employee frustration is slow Wi-Fi or Internet connection speeds.

When a company’s network slows down it impedes employees’ ability to work, which demotivates them because they feel like they are not performing their job effectively.

Decreased productivity and morale: When you have a poor Internet connection, everyday work tasks can be disrupted. It causes delays with email communications or cloud-based telephone services, software apps, conferencing, and collaboration tools. Employee video chats and conferencing can be spotty and unreliable and they are left waiting around for files to load, emails to send, and attachments to download.

A past study revealed the average employee wastes one week per year waiting on their company’s network to respond. The rippling effect of these costly delays in your company operations and workflow results in poor team collaboration, poor customer communication, employee frustration, ultimately lowering morale and diminishing productivity.

The impact of poor Internet on customer experiences

Customer service: Customers have high expectations when they interact and engage with your business. They have come to expect lightning-fast service, including fast page loads and almost immediate customer service responses. A delay in responsiveness could ultimately move your customer to a competitor resulting in a loss of potential revenue. Studies show that over 50% of users will abandon a page if it doesn’t fully load within 3 seconds, and a one-second delay in response time can result in a 7% decrease in conversions.

Customers have also come to expect free Wi-Fi at your business which is considered a standard available service today, and if the internet speeds are slow, it could be what is making your customers venture to the competitor down the street. Internet issues could mean you’re missing out on potential customers and revenue.

Let’s also not forget the impact of customer perception. When customers have a bad customer experience, be it slow response, dropped voice calls, or slow transactions they are likely not going to buy from your business again, and even worse they may tell others not to do business with you.

To sum it up

As a business owner, providing employees and customers with the best experience possible should be one of your primary objectives and to do this, your Internet connection is one thing you should choose to invest in. While it might be tempting to choose a residential or low-speed business solution you need to ensure that your Internet connection can keep up with the demands of your day-to-day business activities and fulfill the expectations of your employees and customers. Your employees and customers are your lifelines, so ensuring they have the ultimate experience will only streamline your business for success now and in the future.

Speak to an Execulink Business Representative today at 1-877-561-6771 to learn more about the affordable, high-speed business Internet options available.

Check out your High-Speed Business Internet options today!

Strong, reliable business Wi-Fi connectivity is more important now than ever before. A poor connection can have major impacts on your business including decreased productivity, increased employee and customer frustration, and loss of revenue. When faced with slow speed, poor performance, and intermittent connectivity, most people are unable to identify or troubleshoot the connection issues effectively.

There could be many factors involved when it comes to poor Wi-Fi connectivity. We have outlined some of the most common connectivity issues, the metrics we use to help combat these problems, and the hardware recommended to provide reliable coverage and overcome Wi-Fi connectivity issues in your home office or business.

Common Wi-Fi connectivity issues

• Slow or inconsistent speeds
• Intermittent connection throughout the day
• The ability to prioritize the quality of service to mission critical devices (QoS)
• Dead zones in particular areas

To combat the issues above, there are three fundamental metrics that we will get into in more detail later on in this post.

• Signal Strength – how loud the signal is throughout the coverage area
• Airtime Utilization – measures how much of the frequency is being used
• Interference – shows non-Wi-Fi devices adding noise to the wireless network

Recommended hardware to combat connectivity issues

A simple Wi-Fi setup is considered a small office space or a home office.  In areas like this, you can centralize a single router to effectively capture 1000 sq. ft. without issues. However, there are instances when this isn’t enough and a solution beyond a single router or access point may be required.

Execulink’s Complete Wi-Fi Solution, the Premium Router, and Mesh Wi-Fi Node have the technology built in to overcome connection issues in smaller spaces like your home office.  This router and node combination allows for a higher quality Wi-Fi signal in your home or business with faster speeds, improved Wi-Fi coverage, and increased stability for video calls.

Execulink conducted an internal study when testing the Premium Router to see the difference compared to traditional routers. The Premium Router has a greater Wi-Fi coverage area, providing stronger connections in problem areas. The improved signal’s stability also decreases video call drops. The enhanced performance of the Premium Router is accomplished through auto-correcting features that improve speed, coverage in problem areas, and stability. With the ability to add mesh Wi-Fi nodes you can expand your network to blanket your whole home in strong Wi-Fi.

You also have the ability to view wireless stats for each device in your home, allowing for proper placement of your devices when installing them or troubleshooting when they are not getting optimum speeds.

When is a Mesh Wi-Fi Node required?

When deciding if you need to add a Mesh Wi-Fi Node or extender to your home. First, you should consider your home layout and what factors you have that will influence your signal. Normally moving the router to a more central location in an open area, away from other electronics, cement walls, steel doors, or enclosed areas will provide a better signal. If that is not a possibility, we suggest adding a Mesh Wi-Fi Node for those hard-to-reach areas.

Next, you must determine the placement of the Mesh Wi-Fi Node. They should be in between your router, and your problem-Internet areas. If your office is having connectivity problems, adding a Mesh Wi-Fi node in your office will not help. You would need to add a Mesh Wi-Fi node in between your router and your office.

Modern router features

There are a few features that modern routers offer to improve your Wi-Fi connection including:

MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output): Allows many devices to talk to the router at once. This decreases the time each device has to wait for a signal and dramatically speeds up your network.

Band Steering: This automatically connects your devices to the best available Wi-Fi frequency in your home. Modern routers have Dual-Band support, which means there are two Wi-Fi radios – a 2.4 GHz band and a 5 GHz band. Band steering will automatically select which frequency is best to reduce connection drops. Some people choose to separate these two bands to have separate Wi-Fi network names for each band frequency. This would involve connecting certain devices to the 2.4 GHz band frequency and network and others to the 5 GHz band frequency and network.

Unified SSID: The Premium Router offers a unified SSID which means that both of these bands (2.4 GHz and 5 GHz) are controlled under one Wi-Fi network. This means remembering only 1 Wi-Fi Network name and password and you will still get the right frequency for your devices.

Direct your Wi-Fi to your devices

The image on the left shows a typical router’s Wi-Fi coverage, demonstrating the limitations many routers have. The image on the right is the Wi-Fi signal strength of the Premium Router.

The Premium Wi-Fi Router improves performance by reducing interference and focusing the wireless signal directly to your device using beamforming technology. Beamforming focuses the signal directly to the devices rather than having the signal spread in all directions from a broadcast antenna. This technology can help improve wireless bandwidth utilization and increase a wireless network’s range in your home office.

Large buildings and enterprise solutions

Now let’s talk about larger buildings and enterprise solutions. If you’re not working from home, and need Wi-Fi in a larger office space, there are more in-depth tools that allow for better troubleshooting of deployments. You can leverage various technologies to identify interferers and implement solutions that will anticipate capacity growth. There are also cloud-managed solutions to troubleshoot and make changes in your network in real-time.

Spectrum Analyzer

This solution is recommended for small and medium-sized businesses vs. residential properties. The spectrum analyzer allows us to look for interference spikes or utilization.

Some common devices that cause interference include baby monitors, Bluetooth devices, wireless headsets, appliances (such as microwaves), or audio transmitters which all compete for the 2.4 GHz network and add to airtime utilization. Airtime utilization is a metric used to gauge a channel’s overall traffic. It’s represented as a percentage. The higher the airtime utilization, the more congested the network becomes.

Placement

One of the most important factors that contribute to your wireless health is placement. Identifying the best spot for a router or access point is crucial. Begin by defining your coverage goal, and place your router or access points where connectivity is needed the most. Get as many devices on the 5 GHz spectrum manually or via band steering and eliminate as many interferers as possible.

Key takeaways

• To enhance coverage in a home office consider adding a router with mesh capabilities
• Auto-correcting features of modern routers can help overcome Wi-Fi challenges through beamforming and band steering
• There is a lot of competition on the 2.4 GHz band frequency with baby monitors, Bluetooth devices, wireless headsets, appliances (such as microwaves), or audio transmitters
• Identifying the best spot for a router or access point is crucial to sustain connectivity
• Troubleshoot larger Wi-Fi deployments using a spectrum analyzer and other available technologies

To learn more on troubleshooting your Wi-Fi connectivity in your home office or business watch our Webinar today or call an Execulink Business Representative at 1-877-561-6771.

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Types of Internet Solutions: Which is best for your business?

In a previous blog, we discussed the primary step when choosing an Internet Service for your business – Shared and Dedicated Access. Now we want to take you through the second step, which is selecting the right delivery method for your Internet services. Delivery methods are the different technologies used to deliver the internet to your business and the most common types are Fibre, Cable, DSL, Wireless, and Satellite.

Similar to choosing the internet connection, choosing the delivery method is dependent on your business needs. You need to understand your organization’s current and future IT requirements and look at key variables including location, speed, reliability, bandwidth, and cost.

Below we explain the differences between the most common types of internet delivery technologies to help you select the option that’s best suited to your business.

Internet Types: How they work and the pros and cons of each

Satellite Internet

Satellite Internet uses a satellite orbiting earth to get an internet signal from your provider, which is delivered to your business through a provided satellite dish receiver and then to your modem where it’s translated into an internet connection.

Because the signals have to travel out of Earth’s atmosphere and the satellite is over 20,000 miles from your business, it opens the door to interference and latency causing significant time delays in sending and receiving data. The speed and reliability can also be negatively affected due to weather and obstructions like trees, wind, rain, and sunspots that interfere with the satellite signals, resulting in slower speeds and downtime. This can be a significant problem if you’re a business that needs 24/7 access.

Satellite Internet is a good choice for businesses operating in rural and remote areas that don’t have any other options like Fixed wireless, DSL, or Fibre.

Pros:

• Rural and remote accessibility

Cons:

• Slower download/upload speeds
• Reliability impacted by weather and physical obstructions
• More expensive than other types of internet

Wireless Internet

Wireless Internet or Fixed Wireless Internet transmits an Internet signal through the air over wireless waves via a nearby tower to a device mounted on the outside wall or roof of your business. The receiver will offer you access to the web through an Ethernet cable that connects to the router in your business. Your router then supplies access to the Internet via Wi-Fi so you can connect multiple devices. At Execulink, we have several wireless towers across southwestern Ontario.

Fixed wireless speeds are typically faster than Satellite, but it depends on your provider and location. Speed options generally allow for things like web browsing, video streaming, fast file downloads, and interaction with rich web applications. However, it’s important to note that though it’s more reliable and dependent than satellite, the quality of Wireless Internet can also be affected by weather or obstructions between the tower and receivers like trees or buildings sometimes resulting in slower speeds and downtime.

Fixed Wireless is a great option for eligible rural businesses, typically where Cable and DSL infrastructure does not reach.

Pros:

• No phone or cable lines are required
• Reliable and fast service
• Rural and remote accessibility
• Can be used as a backup internet solution to keep your business online if the landline is compromised

Cons:

• A line of sight connection with the access point is required which makes availability limited

DSL Internet

DSL (Digital Subscriber Loop) is a stable, cost-effective Internet connection to your business delivered through a standard telephone line that is connected to a modem. The modem can connect your office devices through wireless or wired local area networks (LAN). Contrary to Dial-up internet, you are able to use your phone and internet services at the same time.

With typical download speeds from 1 to 50 Mbps and upload speeds from 1 to 10 Mbps, DSL is an ideal solution for small businesses with less data-intensive tasks such as sending emails, browsing the web, downloading small files, and moderate file sharing and cloud backup.

Pros:

• Widely available, even in rural areas
• Affordable

Cons:

• Slower speeds than cable
• Quality is contingent upon your distance from ISP

Cable Internet

Cable Internet is a service that uses Coaxial Cable to deliver a fast, cost-effective internet connection to your business through a modem. It is one of the most common internet types and more widely available than Fibre.

With speeds ranging from 10 Mbps to 1 Gbps, it’s an ideal solution for businesses with high bandwidth web uses such as cloud-based applications, VPN access, video streaming, and file sharing. However, it’s important to note that the bandwidth on a cable connection is typically shared, so if there are other subscribers connecting simultaneously, your business might experience slower speeds.

Pros:

• Widely available
• Faster speeds than DSL or Satellite

Cons:

• Subject to slowdowns during peak usage
• Lower accessibility in rural and remote areas

Fibre Internet

Fibre Internet typically uses a clear glass core (Fibre) wrapped in a plastic cladding to support the transmission of light instead of traditional electrical signals. This is what separates Fibre from copper wire and Wireless services. Fibre surpasses both Cable and DSL Internet options in terms of response and speed. Fibre Internet can carry large amounts of data over its cables, moving at the speed of light. Since DSL and Cable signals are electronic, this can cause latency. Fibre Internet uses light waves as a signal, so the latency experienced with DSL and Cable is avoided.

Most Fibre plans offer speeds up to 1 Gbps which means it can easily support multiple devices using Wi-Fi in your business. It’s the best solution for businesses running applications that require low latency and high upstream bandwidth such as large data backups and sensitive voice and video. Through a dedicated Fibre line, the service is more secure, with less opportunity for interference. And with the flexible bandwidth, it easily scales to accommodate business growth while ensuring quality performance.

Pros:

• Provides high speeds
• Reliable, quality service
• Symmetrical speeds

Cons:

• Not widely available

The Takeaway

Determining what type of internet connection is right for your company depends on your business needs and demands. If your office is in a remote or rural area with no access to landline connections, then satellite or fixed wireless might be the only option. If you need faster speeds for server hosting and constant cloud-based computing, you should consider Fibre if it’s available in your area. And, if budget is a factor then a more affordable DSL solution might suffice.

There are many variables to consider when choosing an internet type. Consider the following when you are trying to decide what is right for your business.

Budget: Determine what your business can afford and look at plans that meet your requirements. Look for cost savings with bundle offers by Internet Service Providers. Many ISP’s like Execulink offer internet bundles with Business Phone and TV services.

Availability: Not all internet options are available everywhere, so find out what providers and plans are available in your area.

Speed and reliability: Assess your Internet usage. If your business has heavy usage you will require faster speeds but if you just need access for downloading, email, and web browsing you can likely go with lower speeds.

To learn more about the types of Internet connections available for your business, call an Execulink Business representative today.

Check out your Business Internet options today!