Three ways wifi can boost your business

Taking your office wireless can help to boost your business, according to Vox Telecom Executive Head of Network and Operations Shane Chorley, who says there are three primary ways a managed wifi network can change the way your company runs:

1. Increase productivity
“If your employees have to stay tied to their desks if they want to be online, you’re killing their productivity,” says Chorley. “They should be able to fire off a quote or check their email whether they’re in a meeting, having a smoke break on the stoep or taking a coffee break in the canteen.”

This is especially important for customer-facing staff, he says. “If a client comes in to look at a car, or have their tyres changed or get an insurance assessment, you’re wasting their time if you have to go back to a desk or send them somewhere else to generate a quote. A sales rep armed with a wifi-enabled tablet can give much faster, more appropriate service.”

2. Bring customers in the door
Restaurants were the first to realise they could attract customers with free wifi, but Chorley says they won’t be the last. “If I have a choice of two places to get my tyres changed, and one of them offers free Internet access while I wait, guess which one I’ll choose?”

But there are many more possibilities, says Chorley. “Combine free wifi with location awareness and push advertising and you have a powerful marketing tool,” he says. “If the mall offers wifi to every customer who enters, for example, a clothing store can easily advertise their jeans promotion to every device connected nearby – and then track exactly who comes in the door as a result.”

3. Improve communication
“Email has become so cluttered that many people hardly read it anymore,” says Chorley. “It’s a terrible way to send round an office memo or advertise today’s lunch specials. But with wifi access enabled for everyone on the premises, it’s easy to push alerts and ads through to their mobile devices.”

“It’s all about extending your corporate network to the edge of your organisation,” says Chorley. “You need to do it right to maintain security and ensure good service levels – but once you have the platform in place, it opens a wealth of new possibilities.”