Sitefinity Load Balancing Helps Keep Enterprise ecommerce Websites Running Smoothly Successful ecommerce businesses must plan for large amounts of traffic and be able to handle the growth success will bring. Whether a company is launching its first online store or an existing site is in need of restructuring, a cloud-based or hybrid platform-developing host will securely oversee the creation of a site that’s scalable for constant availability. Today, even when using conservative assessments, the number of goods and services that are purchased by people and businesses online total well into the hundreds of millions. In fact, leading experts estimate that the dollar value of ecommerce comes to several hundreds of billions. Because of this, companies must make sure that their ecommerce division is ready for any amount of Internet traffic. Load balancing capabilities help make Sitefinity for ecommerce implementations a solid choice of CMS. For years, the only companies and organizations able to take advantage of server load balancing were those with large budgets. Technological advancements and competition have changed this dynamic. Today, small and medium sized companies are also able to use server load balancing to improve: Performance Availability Scalability Benefits of Load Balancing For the successful implementation of an ecommerce initiative, a company must have a properly operating site that offers optimum performance. Consumers expect sites that are constantly up and running. These expectations have resulted in server load balancers and application delivery to arise as one of today’s most important technologies since they are designed to resolve the issues of accessibility and basic performance when it comes to ecommerce applications. When considering its fundamental form, a load balancer is responsible for sending users to accessible servers. If one server malfunctions, the load balancer will take it offline and automatically redirect users to the system’s functioning servers. Along with providing this feature, advanced load balancers will dispense users to servers that deliver the best available performance. In addition, multiple servers are able to operate as one. Because of this, simultaneous requests can be processed at the same time, which increases a site’s efficiency. To provide an even better site experience for users, some load balancers offer Secure Sockets Layer, or SSL, acceleration. This lets the system offload some of the security processes from its ecommerce application servers to improve performance while reducing the time and expense that comes with each server’s SSL certificate management. When ecommerce enterprises use several load balanced servers to manage online traffic, IT administrators can take care of regular maintenance on each server without negatively affecting the site. This includes software updates and code upgrades. Constructed for Scalability Online traffic affects a website’s ability to perform effectively. Fortunately, companies like Clarity are coming up with solutions. Because today’s advancements are allowing platform providers to distribute a site’s traffic across several servers to maintain its ability to function effectively, companies have a better upgrade choice. Load balancing for scalability is an easier and more affordable option than transferring an entire site to a new server with more power. Sites that run their entire systems on virtual servers will especially benefit from this technology because platform providers can clone an existing server and add it to the site’s load balanced collection. This is a more affordable option than other system adjustments. Scalability is a necessary system capability during seasonal spikes as well as when sudden demands arise. Sitefinity's SEO tools can also be employed to help increase traffic from search engines. Companies that use the cloud will gain the feeling of having an unlimited infrastructure. Server administrators have the ability to decrease or increase the amount of servers in use depending on the current needs of a website. Most ecommerce sites require this option as many of them must be able to handle an influx of traffic during holiday seasons. In 2014, ecommerce holiday spending totaled 53.3 billion U.S. dollars. That year, Cyber Monday broke records by becoming the biggest shopping day in history. Online spending came to more than 2 billion U.S. dollars. During the holidays, consumers also used their smartphones more frequently. In fact, 51 percent of holiday shoppers unlocked their smartphones to compare prices and save money. This statistic should encourage companies to focus on how accessible they are to these users. With one or more web servers that are capable of load balancing, sites are able to function quickly regardless of the amount of traffic. A Few Tech Details With access to Sitefinity’s system, Clarity is able to offer Sitefinity customization. A load-balanced environment, which is also known as a web farm, lets companies increase an application’s functionality. Load balanced setups include several main elements. These are the multiple server nodes for application hosting and the load balancer. The amount of servers required for consistent operation depends on a company’s needs and parameter obligations like reliability and output. To decide which node processes a user’s activity on the site, the load balancer activates a set of predetermined factors based on the application’s limitations and configurable data. Once a business manager has determined the company’s system requirements, he or she will need to select a setup for the load balancer. Sitefinity has the technology to support hardware or software load balancers. Load balanced server construction allows for several Sitefinity applications. Multiple web servers host the applications, and they process requests for a single user. This type of setup allows the system to redirect a user to a different application per request. A Customizable Service With customizable load balancing capabilities, your company’s site will be able to manage more and more traffic as your business starts to grow. By choosing Clarity, you’ll have access to a company that has the partnerships and framework options to create a customized program for your business. Our staff is professionally trained, and they have the skills to include load-balancing programming in your system. Free quotes are available as are consultations. Give us an opportunity to create a tailor-made setup for your company.