Why Serious Businesses Monitor Web Service Availability

Ensuring that a web service is always available is the key to making your business accessible to the right audience. When service is interrupted, it can harm business profits, functions, and public reputation. Research has found that for larger enterprises, 90% lose an average of over $100,000 USD for each hour of downtime. If you monitor web service availability as a standard practice, your business can address problems as they arise or to deploy preventative action before trouble even strikes. Companies who wish to be taken seriously online need to have something in place which prevents service downtime. A study found that poor web service is one of the top three negative influencers on potential consumers.

Is Downtime Such a Problem?

When a web service is unavailable, profits from that service are inevitably lost until it is restored. However, there are also other hidden costs to consider – such as the impact on business reputation, the loss of business to competitors and the labor costs to find and repair the problem. StudyWeb estimates that if all data centers were to shut down at the same time, $69 trillion USD would be lost every single hour. It also found that $13 billion USD is lost each year through data center downtime.

A business site crash can be catastrophic – leaving potential customers unable to buy products, engage services or even find the company in the first instance. All companies aim for 100% uptime across all online content, but managing that alone can be a real struggle. When your car stops working and you get stranded by the roadside, you know that your auto assistance team will respond quickly and get you moving again. Your hosted solutions manager can provide that same response service for your content and systems.

Driving Toward Success With Monitored Hosted Solutions

Consider your vehicle for a moment. When disaster strikes and your car breaks down or has an accident, you could be left stranded at the roadside and searching for a specialist to step in and fix the problem. Unless your passenger happens to be a mechanic, you will likely have to wait until help reaches you – and pay extra for the call-out, too.

Now imagine your car is a state of the art model with on board diagnostics and a self-repair function built in. As soon as a problem arises, the computer system will identify and resolve the issue. Before you ever reach the point of breakdown, the monitoring function will alert you to the problem, apply a fix if possible, and let you continue driving with confidence. If something with the car starts to fail, such as falling tire pressure or struggling brakes, the computer will apply a fix or alert you to the problem immediately.

Why Does This Matter When Thinking About Hosted Solutions?

In a lot of ways, a well-managed web service is just like that self-diagnostic vehicle. Having a car computer system in place that monitors for faults and problems, and addresses them as soon as they arise, will give you confidence to drive without worry. A managed service provider can do the same thing for your online business functions – your MSP will monitor web service availability and allow you to concentrate on running your company, safe in the knowledge that everything is going smoothly.

A vehicle breakdown leaves you entirely stuck until the problem is resolved. Knowing that a mechanic will be with you immediately can be a big comfort and can minimize time spent off the road – those without roadside assistance may need to abandon their vehicle and consider alternative transport. When your website has downtime or your services crash, your clients experience the same frustration as a stranded driver. Without specialist support to get the issue resolved, consumers will seek an alternative provider to meet their needs.

That computerized vehicle will work to ensure you never even reach the point of breakdown. Instead, any problems with the car’s brakes, engine, electronics, or tires will be spotted and a fix applied or action recommended to the driver before they get worse. Managed service providers can do the same for your business.

Driving Toward Online Success

Confidence in your MSP can give you the freedom to concentrate on your business, knowing that downtime is highly unlikely and that all issues are being taken care of. Even when it comes to sensitive material, such as client databases and personal accounts, you can be sure that everything is safe and being taken care of. An increasing number of businesses are using hosted Cloud storage to hold confidential data, including 56% of respondents in a 2013 study by the Ponemon Institute. The study’s results suggests those respondents feel “confident in their Cloud service providers,” said lead researcher Larry Ponemon. Just like when driving that computerized car, MSPs give businesses the reassurance that every system is in the safest hands, and that any unexpected problems will be quickly addressed and resolved.

Managing and monitoring web service availability can determine how successful web service provisions are in the future, and can prevent issues even before they arise. A company wishing to make serious progress against the competition should be prepared at all times through a trusted MSP with a secure monitoring package, avoiding costly and damaging downtime issues.

Trust Liquid Web to Monitor Web Service Availability for You

Liquid Web’s Sonar Monitoring is designed to watch over your key systems (such as http, DNS, FTP, SSH/RDP, MySQL/MSSQL, ICMP, cPanel/Plesk, SMTP, and POP3) and provide regular diagnostics, alerting technicians to problems immediately and preventing downtime of your web services.

“With our checks, everything from firewall irregularities to journal inconsistencies can be detected as soon as they happen, often allowing us to fix the problem before you or your customers notice it.”

With Liquid Web monitoring web service availability on your behalf, you can confidently concentrate on your company’s operations.

Trust Liquid Web to monitor web service availability and to offer support when you need it. Contact us today for more information – we are available 24/7 to chat online or over the phone.