#virtual lan

If executed successfully, hosting a conference event at your hotel can showcase your venue to a wide network of professionals and open a series of revenue-generating and brand-catapulting opportunities for your business.

Conferences can offer a dynamic and uplifting atmosphere, busy and alive with engaging activity.

Would you ever host a conference in your hotel foyer?

Perhaps an odd question to ask, surely a designated function room is likely to cause far less disruption for your hotel’s daily operations, regular guests and conference attendees alike, right?

Well... yes, exactly.

Let’s face it, the logistics of staging a conference amidst the commotion of your already-active hotel lobby doesn’t make sense for anybody involved. Holding such an event, smack-bang in the middle of your hotel entrance, would obviously cause inconvenience for the high volume of people accessing your venue with too many conversations taking place across varying themes; it would be impossible for anyone to hear information relevant to them. People would be squeezing past and shuffling around the crowd. Communication would become frustrating, need repeating, and become completely unproductive before eventually failing altogether.

So, imagine experiencing a similar inconvenience and frustration when conference attendees, guests and employees attempt to access your internet network? The comparison is much the same.

Since the early 1990s, WiFi has fast developed into an essential commodity comparable to our basic utilities. Similarly, since the term “smartphone” was first coined over 20 years ago, individuals now carry laptops, tablets and smartphones, equating to an average of much more than one connected device per person. For this reason, it has gradually become increasingly common for network providing venues to experience high-traffic overloading their WiFi service.

If you've ever attended an event and struggled with a sluggish WiFi connection, you may recall the feeling of frustration. Perhaps you sought discussions with other people to find out if they, too, were experiencing problems with the network? It is natural to ask whether the issue is related to your device or the network, most likely, it was due to congestion on a singular network; a poor performing WiFi network can quickly distract attention into a rather negative topic of conversation. Vice-versa, it is also possible to significantly improve guest satisfaction, as evident in this case study, with a well-performing and reliable network.

The solution?

In this analogy, to designate bandwidth in the form of a VLAN for your WiFi network, would hypothetically build a separate function room for your event attendees to congregate in. Doing this can help to immensely improve the service experienced by both your conference delegates and regular travelling guests, as it prevents the event from clogging-up your hotel entrance... easier access for everyone! Furthermore, it can also ensure that productivity and security is maintained for your team’s back office tasks.

Virtual Local Area Network.

Since the term “smartphone” was first coined in 1995, individuals now carry laptops, tablets and smartphones, equating to an average of much more than one connected device per person. For this reason, it has gradually become increasingly common for network providing venues to experience moments of high-traffic, which overload their WiFi service and lead to unhappy users.

Increasing a network’s bandwidth is certainly one solution to this issue, however, for a network which just needs to cope with the occasional peak in traffic, this may be an unnecessary cost. Instead, an alternative solution is to deploy a conference VLAN.

VLAN explained

Imagine that your internet operates like a road. Your network is the road taking people to their online destinations, and every device which connects to your network travels like a vehicle along that road.

Bandwidth is the capacity of the network, and consequently most comparable to the number of lanes on your road. Network bandwidth is a fixed commodity. Adding more lanes to the highway would be one way of increasing bandwidth, however for this, you may need to dig up the road and rebuild.

Speed refers to the transfer rate of the data, it is subject to fluctuations and can be determined by how fast the car in front is going, how busy traffic is and whether there are any roadworks disrupting your journey.

If the road has enough capacity to manage the volume of traffic, there is unlikely to be an issue, however, a sudden surge of vehicles travelling at the same time, will inevitably build up traffic, and the speed consequently slows down. This will be felt by everyone using that network, including your back-office computers, residing guests and daytime visitors.

Alternatively, if you were prepared to forecast surges in traffic or quickly respond to increased demand, then you can quickly deploy an alternative route designated for certain vehicles. This parallel route is basically how VLAN works, helping to maintain traffic conditions for everyone.

James Richmond, CEO of Nevaya, a British-based company specialising in WiFi for hotels explains, "Many hotels experience difficulty in maintaining and managing their network. The hospitality industry experiences particular peaks in occupancy throughout the year, and when hotels experience the occasional surge in the number of devices, or data being used, it is not unusual to find your internet network, which previously performed without issues, may suddenly struggle to cope with the workload."

"The effect this can have on a business is a poor and disappointing guest experience, at a particularly sensitive time, when your brand is exposed to more guests than usual"

"This headache can easily be resolved with the right WiFi network and features. Deploying a VLAN can allow you to distribute bandwidth as required, maximising the efficiency of your network."

Further to these benefits, VLANs also enhance security. A VLAN allows users to share sensitive information without it being seen by other network users. Aside from the reassurance this subsequently offers your guests, this is also a significant reassurance for your back-office operations, which can be segregated further, such as for individual departments or protected managerial access.

Mira la nota http://www.servervoip.com/blog/beneficios-de-implementacion-de-vlans/

Beneficios de implementación de VLANs