Currently set to No Index

Can You Handle E-commerce Alone?

Constant efficiency and availability are critical factors for any company whose business revolves around e-commerce.  Every element of the organization’s architecture from operating system and web applications to hardware and network connectivity must be designed with fault tolerance and redundancy in mind.  An inaccessible website or damaged OS kernel could put your operation on halt and send customers in the direction of another retailer.  With your competition located just a quick click away, it is crucial to the take the necessary steps to make sure your systems are always available.

The Challenges of Cost and Maintenance

In order to accurately gauge the costs of obtaining greater availability for your systems and infrastructure, you must first determine the degree of reliability your business requires.  For many large online businesses, storing data and applications in multiple locations is an ideal solution.  While relying on a multitude of redundant data centers can help an organization achieve that elusive 100% level of availability, investing in such facilities can be a rather costly and daunting task.  Not only must you consider the expense of building or even leasing a facility, but also hiring a dedicated IT staff and the ongoing maintenance of your systems.  Achieving the fastest response times and the best performance typically demands a world-class service and support on an around the clock basis.

RELATED:   New Facebook Social Media Store

Considering Third-Party Help

One challenge many organizations are faced with today is the decision to create and maintain their systems in-house, or rely on a third-party company to host their applications and IT operations.  Making a decision on either model is based on various factors.  Experience and infrastructure are two great reasons to choose an outside vendor.  Professional hosting companies have access to data center facilities and infrastructures that the average business would have a difficult time replicating internally.  Traveling this route can give you the ability to do away with expensive upfront investments on servers and applications, while sparing your company the burden of maintaining complex systems.  You also have a better chance of getting a scalable infrastructure that allows for upgrades as your business grows and its demands increase.  In addition, choosing a third-party hosting provider as your partner enables your company to leverage both the good and bad times they have experienced.  This in turn, better assures that the host can effectively handle trouble problems when they arise.

RELATED:   What You Need in E-commerce Hosting

If you do choose to partner with an outside firm, it is important to go carefully go over the fine print and pay close attention to what is being guaranteed.  You need to make sure the obligations and commitment to reliability are clearly outlined in the contract so that everything is understood by all parties.  If you can, take a physical tour throughout the provider’s facility to ensure that the best practices are being followed and your e-commerce systems are taken care of.  Should your internal IT staff be strong enough to maintain the entire project internally, be sure to devise a sound strategy that will keep your systems online despite the hardships or disasters that might come your way.

How to Find a Successful Name For Your New Blog?
How to Find a Successful Name For Your New Blog?

One of the most important decisions you can make to ensure your blog is among the best is to select a name. While there are more than 500 million blogs available...

How-to Start a Blog – Review of the Best 10 Blogging Platforms
How-to Start a Blog – Review of the Best 10 Blogging Platforms

If you want to start a blog as fast as possible, then you need to consider choosing a blogging platform. Thankfully, there are some excellent free and paid blogging platforms...

How Referral Marketing Can Benefit Web Hosts
How Referral Marketing Can Benefit Web Hosts

Even if the niche of web hosts are fully loaded with a lot of companies they are still one of the easiest to promote because you could write your own...

Broken Links: How to Find, Fix, and Benefit from Broken Links
Broken Links: How to Find, Fix, and Benefit from Broken Links

Links are what holds the web together. Essentially, the web is named as such because of the ability for pages and sites to link to other sources and relevant information....

Brand Value & the Most Powerful Brands (with Infographic)
Brand Value & the Most Powerful Brands (with Infographic)

Brand value – everyone wants it, however, only few are able to achieve it. The subject of “brand value” holds a significant position amongst marketers, executives, and entrepreneurs. Let’s discuss...

Reasons why your business should shift to Cloud hosting
Reasons why your business should shift to Cloud hosting

Cloud hosting has been on the rise since its inception. The improvement to your website performance and business efficiency that comes with Cloud hosting is almost tangible.

Why We Love the IT Support Career?
Why We Love the IT Support Career?

In almost all of my posts I was talking about the stressful side of the IT – the long hours, end user issues, migrations, midnight calls and the like. But...

IT Manager: Ways To Show Your Appreciation To Your Team
IT Manager: Ways To Show Your Appreciation To Your Team

Surely your team struggled hard and made things happen. You cannot say “this is what you get paid for” and just leave – you cannot keep your IT staff that...

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *