Why you need network monitoring systems and what they can do for you
The COVID-19 changed our world in the past year and has affected nearly every aspect of life. Due to the pandemic, the world is more connected than ever before. Businesses nowadays have more smart, connected products that are transforming their networks. Many companies consider adopting more IoT, Artificial Intelligence solutions, Data Analytics, or Machine Learning to help them make better decisions and work efficiently. However, we must not forget that modern networks are complex animals and this complexity may bring many possibilities for things to go wrong.
Networks need to be maintained and security needs to be strengthened more than ever.
As a result, organizations of all sizes are looking for a knowledgeable, reliable partner that can deliver services and support consistently.
In other words, it has never been a better time for network monitoring than now.
Today, we’ll explore the 5 steps to start your network monitoring journey. We’ll also try to explain why network monitoring is important and what can do for you.
1) Why to monitor - Realize what’s on your network
Let me ask you a very simple question: Do you know what’s on your network?
If your answer is “Yes”, think twice.
I’m sure that your organization has routers and switches, virtual servers, wireless devices, and applications of all kinds that need 24/7 monitoring. Sometimes a device goes down with apparently no reason, sometimes employees bring to the office their personal IoT devices, these are all events that need to be monitored.
Nothing worse can happen than getting a call from a user or customer complaining that the network is down. Too often, IT professionals don’t have the visibility they need to monitor every single device on the network. Once you have time to investigate and understand the reason for the issue, it may be too late. You need to have a high-level look at your infrastructure and rely on proactive monitoring tools to keep your business running.
2) What to monitor - Connect everything you can
If you want to know everything about your network, you have to connect everything you can and automate it.
Here are some easy ways you can start to implement automation:
- Choose what to automate
It’s all about choosing the right functions to automate. Identify the right internal functions and processes that can be automated to eliminate repetitive tasks such as reporting and ticketing, software updates, and regular backups.
- Find the right tool to automate
Implement a professional services automation (PSA) tool like ConnectWise Manage to allow your clients to monitor, manage, track and resolve issues with their network and devices. A great PSA software brings order to your operations, enables you to connect your entire operation through a single pane of glass, providing clarity for what’s happening (or not) in your business.
- Adopt a proactive network monitoring system
Find the right network monitoring system integrated with your favorite PSA tool so that you can monitor, manage and resolve issues in real-time.
Domotz announced the integration with ConnectWise Manage in October 2020: this integration allows you to automatically perform a variety of diagnostic and preventive maintenance routines for your clients to identify potential difficulties before they become major problems.
Key benefits of using a proactive monitoring system integrated with a PSA tool:
- Better use of IT resources and internal communication.
- Reduced manual work for IT teams. That means valuable communication between members of the staff and more confidence in the business’s ability to sustain and grow satisfied customers.
- Clear visibility into the network.
- Big picture of all the connected devices in the network: see how data is moving among them, and quickly identify and correct issues that can undermine performance and lead to outages.
- Improved productivity and efficiency.
3) How to monitor - Detect problems before users do
Network monitoring provides the information that network administrators need to determine, in real-time, whether a network is running optimally. IT service professionals are becoming increasingly responsible for everything and anything on the network. Their main objective is to keep businesses operational and secure from cyber risks and attacks, along with the potential of monitoring security cameras and managing firewall configurations. Thus, the need of utilizing an intuitive network monitoring system that can manage and solve mission-critical problems.
Here are some of the major benefits of adopting a network monitoring system:
- Monitoring: Analyzing performance in real-time
Users can be informed of network issues meaning that if an issue is detected, the user can be immediately alerted when important events occur on your monitored networks. You can receive notifications for events like: Connection Lost/Recovered, New Device Discovery Alerts, Security issues Alerts, and Alert setting for Network Performance trigger thresholds.
- Management: Detecting problems before users do
A network management solution provides secure remote access to any device in the network to identify issues and troubleshoot before they become real problems.
- Security: Proactive monitoring to boost security
Network monitoring systems help protect critical business data by regularly providing important background information on all network traffic. By proactively monitoring all the systems on the network, such software is continuously searching for signs that indicate a problem is about to happen. With such a tool, IT administrators can proactively identify deficiencies, optimize efficiency, and troubleshoot.
In addition, relying on network monitoring software enables users to resolve problems faster and more efficiently.
Finally, network monitoring systems can assist you in being able to identify the specific areas of your network that are experiencing problems. This means that you can quickly discover and resolve the issue, saving you time and money when it comes to addressing the problem.
4) Connect with your clients - Increase customer satisfaction
A high level of customer satisfaction is a business goal for every company and a key to the success of every manager. Above all, customer satisfaction affects your business revenue. A satisfied client uses more services from your company and recommends them to a friend. A non-satisfied one goes to the competition.
How can you improve customer satisfaction and ensure loyalty?
- Listen to your customers
Gather customer information and discover everything about customers’ needs. With the help of a network monitoring system, you’ll get all the information about
- Proactively offer them what they need
Put yourself in your customers' shoes and talk their language. Take a close look at the points at which your customers have contact with your business and evaluate areas of development. Use the data you have from monitoring all on their network, segment your clients, and offer them tailored solutions.
- Learn from your customers
Ask your customers what they think and turn customers’ feedback into action. The best proactive strategies make regular contact throughout the consumer lifecycle.
5) What else to monitor - Look for new opportunities
Even if you are strong in network monitoring, sometimes getting too much information can be even worse than no information at all. Too often, IT professionals focus on monitoring all the functions that keep your business running but don’t have enough time to evaluate areas of development and look for new profit opportunities.
Now that you have segmented your clients, you can think of competitive solutions to offer and expand your services.
Start monetizing pieces of technology relevant for specific customers: remotely monitoring security cameras, IP phone systems, VoIP management, hardware asset inventory, POS monitoring, access control systems, or Digital signage.
A key to success in monetizing new components of your IT service is having cost-effective network monitoring software integrated with reliable business management software to easily monitor and manage critical components of a customer’s network: firewalls, managed switches, wireless access points, and the gateways that these endpoints are sitting on as well as their performances.
Ready to learn more ? Head over to the Domotz marketplace page for more info or to purchase Domotz.
