[Advertorial] Hosting providers promise you all kinds of things, but what can you really count on? An SLA defines essentials such as service availability, and makes promises enforceable. At least: if the SLA is good. What is such an SLA, and what should you pay attention to?
If you choose a hosting provider, you are handing over an important component of your business. It’s not your core business to keep servers for applications and Web sites up and running, but the provider’s. In doing so, you are nevertheless handing over a critical part of the foundation of your business.
In other words, you better choose a good hosting provider. “Good” is subjective, but an SLA is not. The SLA puts in black and white what you can expect, from whom and how quickly.
Service Level Agreement
SLA stands for Service Level Agreement. “It is an agreement between your company and the hosting partner you choose,” says Kenneth Deviaene, Solutions Sales at Combell. This agreement defines very precisely what the two parties can expect from each other. Those expectations relate to service, quality and performance. “This ensures that everyone has the same expectations, and there can be no misunderstandings during the collaboration.”
If you choose to outsource things like hosting, then the SLA is a very important document. After all, the SLA gives you guarantees from the partner you are going with. When choosing a partner, it is important to look at what exactly is in the SLA. These points are very important, according to Deviaene:
- Make sure the SLA guarantees incident resolution times;
- The SLA must guarantee 24/7 monitoring;
- Choose the highest uptime guarantee possible.
Reaction vs. solution
Resolution times are important, but not always present. For example, a provider might advertise very sharp response times. This guarantees that you will have someone on the line quickly when there is a problem, but not that it will fix the problem within a set time frame. “If something goes wrong, you want a solution as quickly as possible,” says Deviaene.
Monitoring is just as important, according to Deviaene. When you know your hosting provider is helping to monitor your server, you can count on them to take proactive action when necessary. Prevention is better than cure: a problem that your partner fixes before it occurs will not cause downtime. Deviaene: “Monitoring reduces the chance of downtime.”
Five nines
The last point speaks for itself. The uptime guarantee indicates the degree to which your provider is confident that the solution you purchase will remain available. The five nines are the gold standard there: 99.999 percent uptime.
That uptime guarantee must be enforceable. Ideally, you choose an SLA where the guarantee is accompanied by compensation if it is not met. “That keeps your hosting provider itself on its toes,” Deviaene believes. A strong SLA with compensation shows how confident the hosting provider is.
This is a commercial contribution in collaboration with Combell. Look here for more information about the company’s solutions.