Why Managed Hosting Matters
Posted on December 18th, 2009
As many of you know, first impressions have a lasting impact. Remember the first time you:
- had your first kiss
- doing your practical driving school examination
- installing SVN incorrectly and getting fired because you had a major #FAIL for losing 6 months of code (hopefully not to many ppl had that happen)
- Your first beer even?
… You get the picture.
First impressions can also have a lasting impact on your business; especially if you aren’t there to personally speak to your potential customers or clients. The odds are that one of the first interactions your customers will have with your business is through your website. Now design & functionality aside, it’s the backend that will be responsible for providing a smooth & seamless experience for your website’s visitors. They want to get the information they want as efficiently as possible, without being impeded by slow load times or various 500 “wtf” server errors.
Take a new website launch for example. You’ve just launched your new venture to an eagerly awaiting public who’s just itching to explore your site, browse your products and make purchases from you. But suppose you didn’t give enough consideration to the back end hosting requirements. The site goes live, you servers are overloaded, and your visitors can barely load the homepage. Think they’ll be understanding? Doubtful. Take newly launched WIND Mobile, one of Canada’s newest wireless providers. They recently launched this week with much anticipation & as soon as their site went live, it became quite apparent that their hosting back endcouldn’t handle all the traffic. Load times were unbearable and their visitors took note. Just look at some of these comments posted by visitors to the company’s various social media accounts and web forums:
These problems aren’t just limited to new website launches too; backend problems can plague established websites as well. Advertising campaigns, word of mouth, seasonality or just plain exposure can cause your daily traffic to spike. Now this is great, but if your visitors can’t get the information they want & have a pleasant user-experience, then it:
- reflects poorly on your brand,
- leaves a bad impression in their minds ,
- costing you money both in the short & long term
For example, several major online retailers such as Hewlett-Packard, Kohl’s and Staples websites weren’t prepared for Black Friday traffic and their reputations paid the price. A recent article by Internet Retailer found that over the Thanksgiving weekend, HPShopping.com had an average response time over 7.79 seconds, over 3 times slower than the top 50 retailer average of 2.25 seconds. Same goes for Staples.com & Kohls.com; both sites experienced slow response times & site crashes. This means disgruntled visitors & higher bounce rates, leaving customers to go to the competitor’s websites with (what was supposed to be) your money. The effects on your company’s brand & reputation are also far reaching. Just look at these blog and forum postings by disgruntled visitors:
Customer service, website functionality & design aside, these cases could have been prevented.
Hello frustrated, confused client. Meet SevenL Networks Inc.
Having a reliable hosting provider that pro-actively monitors and manages your servers. SevenL’s Managed Hosting packages provide you with hassle-free dedicated hosting, meaning that your company’s website is running smoothly. Period.
Our Relentless Customer Support means that we will be with you at a moment’s notice should a problem arise and we will not stop until the problem is resolved. Plus, our 99.9% guaranteed uptime and advanced firewall & security features further protect your servers, giving you piece of mind. Managed hosting solutions give the opportunity to focus on running your business without having to worry about complex technical details. Our managed server plans start at just $299 a month, and every managed server plan includes:
- Service monitor alerts
- Private LAN
- Data Backup
- Managed DNS
- Remote Reboot Device; and
- Hardware Replacement Guarantee
Still have questions about the benefits of managed hosting or on our managed hosting plans? Feel free to give us a call and we’ll be more than happy to find a solution to your business’s hosting needs.