The holiday season can be a busy (and lucrative) time for businesses, but that’s only if your network can handle the increased traffic. A network that buckles under the weight of more traffic than usual can cost you in sales. How do you address this issue so you don’t miss opportunities to make money?

You can start with these five fixes.

5 Strategies to Boost Network Speed

Limit Your Non-Essential Traffic 

There’s a lot of traffic on your network, but not all of it is essential for operations. For example, the bandwidth that keeps your business operational shouldn’t be used for streaming. You can use Quality of Service protocols to make sure that your actual business traffic is prioritized and it’ll keep your team productive.

Upgrade Network Hardware

Your routers and access points are, in a lot of ways, just as important as the rest of your networking hardware. If you’re still using Wi-Fi 6, you’re holding your business back. To get the speed to stay competitive, you need to upgrade to more modern hardware.

Clean Up Your Storage

Data retention is important, but so is the practice of cleaning up your data from time to time. We recommend you periodically review your data to add, remove, or archive any files or applications your business no longer uses. This keeps your network equipment running smoothly.

Review Cabling

Once you’ve finished your data review, it’s time to conduct a cabling audit. Examine the cables that connect your components and take note of any damaged or outdated ones. Ethernet cables are easy to forget about, but they can create serious problems if you’re not paying attention. You should make sure that each cable used has a category rating (or CAT) for the task it’s used for. There are cables designed for large amounts of bandwidth, but they might only be good over short distances. You might find that these cables cannot bend as easily as others, too.

Align Internet Speed with Cloud Use

If you use the cloud for many of your businesss tasks, you’ll want your Internet speed to be ready for that burden. Types of solutions that depend on the cloud include remote desktop, Software as a Service, or other types of applications accessed over an Internet connection rather than locally on your PC. If your network can’t support all the traffic, then you’ll know it’s time for an upgrade.

We’ll Make Sure Your Network Is Ready for Anything

Vertical IT Solutions offers a comprehensive network audit that your business can use to ensure problems are diagnosed and addressed before they become even worse. This allows you to get the most value out of your network. Learn more today by calling us at (928) 889-8487.