The days of paying too much for emergency notification are at an end. And the reason is simple: the cloud.
Many emergency managers and others who buy emergency notification systems (ENS) are under the impression that the size of the ENS company is important. There’s a logic to that position that seems to make sense. After all, a bigger company can send out more messages in a shorter period of time, right?
Wrong. While that logic may have worked 10 years ago, it’s way out of date today. And the reason is simple: the cloud.
By “the cloud”, we mean cloud computing companies, such as Amazon, Google, Microsoft and others. These companies are now providing massive computing power that is very inexpensive, highly reliable, easily scaled to near-infinite capacity, amazingly flexible and highly interconnected with telecom and internet service providers.
Consider this: the largest ENS provider has a total annual revenue of just over $100 million dollars, while Google alone invested over $30 billion dollars on cloud computing technology in just one year. And Google is playing catch-up to Amazon.
And all that investment isn’t just for hardware. Much of it goes to software that automates the failover, security and configuration processes that allow its customers to rely on its highly reliable services. Amazon boasts over 30 security certifications and offers a super-secure version of its AWS services that’s good enough for the Pentagon. And in this area, it’s probably playing catch-up to Microsoft.
In fact, one of the great aspects of the cloud computing business for us, and many other IT companies, is the aggressive competition among them, because it means that their services are constantly improving while their prices actually go down.
The implications for emergency notification services are profound. While Hyper-Reach is a relatively small provider of ENS services, we can actually scale to exactly the same capacity as our very largest competitors. With the same, or better, reliability. And the same, or better, security. (More on these points later.)
So before you agree to pay a premium of 30%, 40%, 50% or more for the supposed security of a larger company, look for ENS companies that leverage the power of cloud computing in delivering their services. (The same logic, BTW, applies to other technologies.) We think you’ll be amazed at how much value you can get – not to mention personal service – while paying less for your ENS system.
