Whether you’re looking at your business computing network from the perspective of your customers or with an internal intranet system in mind, it is important that you have the necessary level of monitoring in place so that you can deliver a satisfactory experience 100% of the time. The choice faced by businesses boils down to whether they wish to come up with an in-house monitoring plan, or outsource this function to a remote company or operator.

What are the pros and cons of each option, and does one definitively beat the other in terms of usage?

In-House Monitoring

This option involves a business paying IT professionals to work within the company.

By far the biggest advantage of in-house monitoring is that a business owner will always know what’s going on from an IT perspective. There can be daily briefings with the IT team and any developments can be tracked easily. There’s also the added benefit of a business owner knowing who is accountable for their network health; if any issues do slip through the net they can easily be picked up at management level and passed on immediately.

The main disadvantage is that it can be expensive to assemble a highly qualified team of IT professionals, particularly if the business is not IT-based in the first place, and is literally only employing these people out of necessity. With in-house monitoring, a business will often be limited to development within the knowledge of the IT team. A monitoring company with a large team and a substantial research and development budget, for example, will have more potential for better performance.

Remote Monitoring

External performance monitoring (end-user or end-to-end monitoring), where all of the network functions of a business are outsourced, is the option favoured by the majority of companies today.

The ability to enjoy the same level of expertise, but at a reduced cost in comparison to in-house monitoring, is the main motivating factor that makes it a popular choice. Many networking functions work when they’re ‘out of sight, out of mind’ for a company. It isn’t something most businesses need to concentrate on, so why spend the money on equipment and people to do so when it can be done remotely, with business leaders only getting involved when absolutely necessary. A remote network manager will take care of everything from system backups to dealing with any issues that may occur. The business contact will merely receive an overview of the things they need to know.

In addition, a remote monitor will be able to implement upgrades or developments without putting any time strain on yourself. They will also ensure a more robust content delivery network by using the resources they have at their disposal to meet your needs. Contrast this with in-house monitoring, where you’ll often find content delivery is compromised if you don’t have the resources or development capability to make improvements or provide the necessary ‘juice’ for your systems.

If there is a disadvantage when it comes to remote monitoring, it is that you might not know exactly how much time is being spent on your network. Yes, a monitoring company has promised you round the clock monitoring, but if they have a portfolio of dozens of clients, how sure can you be that yours is always getting the attention it needs?

In-House or Remote Monitoring?

Although there are clear advantages and disadvantages associated with each monitoring option, remote monitoring offers the more rounded option when it comes to dealing with IT in-house. Both small and large businesses can save time and money by using remote monitoring services, which will make their content delivery network stronger and deliver an all-round more efficient solution.

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