It used to be simple to find the best deals on the services your business needed to grow and
thrive. Telecommunications options such as your long distance service had set rates, and it was a simple matter of calling around to the local providers to find the best deal.
Unfortunately, with the rise of Wi-Fi in offices, it's no longer nearly so simple. Finding affordable wireless Internet prices is a complex job, requiring you to balance different services and different hardware to find the combination that brings you the best ROI.
So, let's take a look at a few of the elements that can affect your wireless Internet prices, and talk about how you can keep this vital service affordable!
Smart Purchasing Brings You The Best Wireless Internet Prices
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The Bandwidth
Your Wi-Fi, of course, uses the same Internet connection as the rest of your office, so it shares bandwidth on the connection. The exact percentage of your connection being used will vary from office to office, but in most cases, it's a pretty sizable chunk – especially if you've been moving away from heavy desktops and towards portable computers.
Your costs for bandwidth will be a large part of the wireless Internet prices you pay, and this aspect is most similar to the traditional telephone company model. Different providers will offer better deals, although bulk rates are more important here.
Prices go down as the size of your pipeline goes up, so it's often better to go with higher bandwidth. A little extra spent early on having fiber or using metro ethernet installed will pay off with cheaper bandwidth, as well as leaving your company plenty of room to grow.
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The Telephone Exchange
These days, wireless Internet and unified communications systems go hand-in-hand. Modern businesses need an all-data telecommunications setup, which means that somewhere along the line, that Voice-over-IP data needs to be translated into the format that traditional copper-wire telephones use.
While it's common to have an Internet provider that doubles as your translation system, called “hosted VoIP,” more and more businesses are coming to install their own exchange. Today, it's as simple as installing a single piece of hardware that sits between your company and the outside telephone grid.
An initial hardware outlay for on-site PBX hosting will quickly pay for itself, as the long-term TCO drops precipitously as the years go on. On the other hand, costs for off-site hosting are likely to only rise as time goes on. Either way, when looking at a ten-year plan, an on-site PBX provides the better value with fewer ongoing costs.
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The Wi-Fi Access Points
The third major cost determining your wireless Internet prices are the access points 
themselves. Wi-Fi tends to have a short range, so most businesses need several access points scattered around their facilities to guarantee everyone has coverage on-site.
In terms of pure price-for-service, we tend to recommend the Adtran Bluesocket Access Points for their robust performance and higher performance than Cisco, but at a much lower cost.
Beyond that, standardizing on a single brand will save your company plenty of money in ongoing maintenance. A single unified system is easier to administer and operate, cutting operational costs while helping you maintain the best possible internal security. Networks thrown together from multiple brands will ultimately end up increasing your expenses.
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Embrace BYOD
Why buy equipment for your employees when they can just use their own? That's Bring-Your-Own-Device, and it's saving companies plenty of money. Nearly every worker these days has a smartphone or tablet that they use as part of their business life. With a unified network, these devices can access the system as safely and securely as equipment purchased specifically for your business.
