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Two Strategies You Haven't Thought of For More Reliable Wi-Fi

Struggling with Wi-Fi reliability? Try these two strategies that give you greater visibility into your network

Your organization depends on stable, reliable Wi-Fi. Without it, customers and staff are frustrated with spotty connections and devices not working properly—and the entire enterprise and its productivity suffer as a result.

If you’re trying to update or troubleshoot your wireless network to keep up, there may be strategies you probably haven’t yet tried. And it matters—after reviewing numerous industry surveys, Gartner estimates that downtime can cost large enterprises over $300,000 per hour!

Consider the benefits of implementing a solid wireless network monitoring program and particularly focusing efforts on end-user satisfaction. Both of these strategies are driven by obtaining detailed visibility.

Here’s what you need to know about wireless network monitoring and the end-user experience that can give you more reliable Wi-Fi within your organization:

Wi-Fi performance monitoring

Wireless network monitoring (WNM) is one of the most advanced techniques out there to ensure reliable Wi-Fi for your organization. This strategy is comprised of many tools that are constantly monitoring each and every aspect of the network. Because there are so many devices trying to connect within a network—including the various access points and user devices, such as smartphones, wearables, and computers—Wi-Fi has to be able to support quite a variety of equipment while monitoring all connections.

Wireless network monitoring tools send notifications to network managers so that issues can be solved immediately. It’s a necessary component of reliable Wi-Fi, particularly because wireless devices don’t have the physical interfaces that might otherwise alert staff of network issues. As such, WNM reveals crucial, specific information that ensures there isn’t any downtime.

Only by implementing proactive, continuous monitoring and testing solutions can you adequately diagnose issues and get them resolved in a timely manner. Wireless network monitoring from 7SIGNAL allows for instant notification of both actual and potential issues within your network.

The quality and performance of the connection is continuously monitored, which takes into account throughput rates, data transfer rates, packet latency, interference, and voice quality, among other aspects of performance.

Important historical and real-time data gained from WNM includes:

  • Discovering non-performing areas
  • Nailing down the root causes of network issues
  • Detailed data graphs and reports that track performance and correlate data
  • Quick verification of the impacts from any changes you make

End-user satisfaction

It’s also crucial to focus on how the end user is experiencing the connection to have more dependable Wi-Fi. This means that mobile devices themselves are used to test out how the network is performing at any given time and in any given place within its boundaries.

The Mobile Eye from 7SIGNAL, for example, allows you to test out Wi-Fi performance based on mobile devices that report on how the network is running in a given area. This provides visibility into how the Wi-Fi is being perceived by each and every device.

The Mobile Eye can run performance tests on many different devices—including laptops, phones, tablets and wearables—and the user doesn’t notice the tests. These assessments generate built-in system reports, allowing the team to resolve issues based on real-time information before the user ever experiences a problem.

7SIGNAL’s Sapphire Eye is another device that can provide consistent information about the end user’s experience. This Wi-Fi sensor ensures accurate measurements and tests can be customized in an automated test profile, and it stores the collected data in the cloud for easy access and analysis.

Using these tools from 7SIGNAL, you’ll see the following benefits:

  • Greater visibility into your Wi-Fi performance
  • The ability to resolve issues before you hear about them from users
  • 80 to 90 percent reduction in troubleshooting, which takes up valuable time in any enterprise
  • Minimized service drops or slowdowns
  • 50 to 100 percent improvement in baseline network performance
  • Reduced costs due to fewer support calls
  • The ability to strategize equipment and network expansion based on real data and analytics

Wireless network monitoring and focusing on the end-user experience are effective strategies for improving network performance. If you haven’t yet implemented these tactics into your Wi-Fi plan, the tools from 7SIGNAL can help.

7SIGNAL® is a leader in enterprise Wireless Network Monitoring. The 7SIGNAL platform is a cloud-based Wireless Network Monitoring (WNM) solution that continuously troubleshoots the wireless network for performance issues – maximizing network uptime, device connectivity, and network ROI. The platform was designed for the world’s most innovative organizations, educational institutions, hospitals, and government agencies and is currently deployed at Booz Allen Hamilton, IBM, Kaiser Permanente, Walgreens, Microsoft, and many others. 7SIGNAL continuously monitors the connectivity of over 4 million global devices. Learn more at www.7signal.com.