Unlike most products and services, a colocation arrangement can be completely customized to meet the needs of each company. In order to determine the cost of the service, you need to first take a look at what equipment you’ll be colocating. The needs of a small business with a couple critical servers will differ from a large enterprise with hundreds of servers and specialized security requirements.

I recently sat down with Greg Fliearman, Customer Service Manager at VISI, as he provided additional insights into what you should look for when shopping for colocation services. In the five-minute video below, Greg walks thru the important considerations for choosing a colocation arrangement, including: power, physical space, connectively, and managed services.

What colocation pricing considerations will most impact your company? Contact Minnesota-based VISI for a free consultation, colocation quote, or to tour of one of our Midwestern data centers.

Tweet

Will colocation grow quickly in 2012 (and beyond)? Almost certainly.

Consider two statistics:

1. Data center space is expected to increase by 15 percent annually.

2. Ownership of data center space is expected to decrease six percent by the end of 2013.

(From a 2010 Frost & Sullivan research report.)

This can only mean one thing: as companies and their computing needs grow, more colocation services are being sought.

This doesn’t surprise us a bit. Over and over, we hear the same question: “How can we manage our IT costs so that we can grow more effectively?” In many cases, “colocation” is a great answer. Why?

• Colocation reduces capital expenditures. Servers can be expensive, but data centers are always expensive. Racks, cooling systems, fire prevention systems, security systems – these all add up to a hefty bill. Colocation cuts that bill down, freeing up capital for better uses. Moreover, the carefully controlled environment at most data centers helps extend the life and functionality of servers, cutting down on maintenance and replacement costs.

• Colocation reduces data center operating expenses. Data centers are also expensive to maintain. IT and security personnel expenses alone are often what drive companies to colocation. Again, they see that that capital can be invested in ways that more directly affect the bottom line.

• Colocation produces peace of mind. Colocation takes worries about physical security, cooling, electricity, connectivity off a company’s collective minds.

• Colocation gives companies flexibility. Companies move and expand all the time. With colocation, they don’t have to worry about the expense, worry, and (in some cases) considerable regulatory compliance associated with moving servers. Colocation also allows companies to grow easily: instead of expanding a data center, all they have to do is rent out extra cabinets.

• Colocation frees up staff…just like it frees up capital to better contribute to a company’s core business.

Want to know more about colocation? Call us at 612-395-9090. You can also take a virtual tour of our Eden Prairie Data Center or request a colocation quote today.

Tweet

Tecmark’s data center was starting to become a burden. When they started looking for a managed hosting solution, VISI stepped to the plate…and the rest is (relatively recent) business history.

Tecmark is a St.Paul-based company that provides customer-loyalty products and consulting for businesses in many industries. Like any retail-based industry, it has to keep up with the latest trends and continually update its services. But it found that an outdated data center was slowing them down – considerably.

Investing in a new data center seemed like a poor use of capital. Their industry required that a company data center be SAS 70 (now SSAE 16) certified, and a significant amount of money would have to be spent – both up front and on a regular basis – on equipment, updates, and training.

Managed hosting, Tecmark decided, was the natural solution. It gave them all the IT infrastructure they needed, it enabled them to grow without worrying about exceeding IT limits, and it gave them the freedom to use their capital on projects related to customer loyalty. By partnering with VISI, in other words, Tecmark was able to focus on it core – and profit-generating – competency.

VISI was able to transition Tecmark to its data center without losing a second of connectivity or an ounce of IT capability. Since then, VISI’s monitoring services have helped Tecmark foresee potential IT problems and adjust their managed hosting solution as needed. VISI has also been by Tecmark’s side with its 24/7/235 service, answering questions and addressing problems as they arise.

With the backing of seasoned experts and a SSAE 16-certified facility, Tecmark can continue to do what it does best: delight customers with superior service and first-rate technology.

Read the entire case study for more details about our work with Tecmark.

Contact us to learn more about managed hosting and other data center services that we provide.

Tweet

How do downtime, outages and other problems impact your business?   How satisfied you are with the level and quality of monitoring you have today?  Are you too busy with routine maintenance to focus on higher-value projects?

VISI is hosting a webinar on January 25, 2012 entitled Partnering with an MSP for Monitoring and Management. MSP’s let you offload specific IT operations while assuming responsibility for monitoring, managing and maintenance of network, software, hardware and related IT systems and functions on your behalf. This webinar will educate participants about the services offered by a managed services provider (MSP) as well as provide a demo of VISI’s advanced monitoring and alerting capabilities. 

View the full description of the webinar and register here.

Tweet

Today VISI announced an exciting new partnership.  Minnesota Public Radio|American Public Media (MPR|APM) has selected VISI as its new managed hosting and data center provider. VISI will host MPR|APM’s web properties, including Marketplace.org and the Public Insight Network (PIN), and utilize a new Software as a Service (SaaS) platform.

“We needed a hosting provider with a top tier facility in the Twin Cities to ensure the best availability for our web and IT services,” said Brad Rosenberger, Manager of IT Infrastructure at Minnesota Public Radio. “Now, more than ever, our listeners rely on MPR for our in-depth online reporting, in addition to our radio broadcasts.”

VISI is honored to be selected as the managed hosting partner of such a prestigious and respected organization as Minnesota Public Radio|American Public Media and we look forward to serving their web hosting needs!

Tweet