The snowman and the snow blog!

Winter effects all businesses, but does the internet also have seasons? Neil Cummins explores winter and the net!

With Christmas looming large on the horizon and darkness descending before teatime, it’s safe to say winter has arrived. Train carriages across the nation feel more claustrophobic than usual thanks to all the padded jackets and chunky jumpers, while workplaces echo to complaints about ungritted roads and icy pavements. Winter is a challenging time for many companies as productivity drops and workplace absenteeism increases, but how does it affect online companies?
One advantage many web firms face is that the internet operates regardless of ambient temperature, and an ecommerce checkout will be equally effective come rain or shine. A web designer or dating site entrepreneur should be able to maintain a consistent level of service even when the weather outside is frightful – honourably accepting real-world issues like postage delays or off-site client meetings.
Unlike water pipes, fibre-optic cabling is generally impervious to cold snaps and should be buried at least six inches below ground level. It is therefore extremely unlikely that frost or storms will cause a website to go offline, particularly as an increasing number of sites are cloud hosted in huge overseas facilities. Despite its meteorological title, cloud storage is impervious to local weather conditions and can be relied upon 365 days a year.
The always-on nature of cloud storage gives online-only companies a distinct advantage over firms with physical premises or office space, and this leads onto another advantage of running an online enterprise. With the right login details and software, a virtual company can be managed from anywhere. Road closures and train cancellations are no barrier to completing a full day’s work. Freelancers can still communicate via email and Skype, while employees can be almost as productive at home as they can be in the office. Even software like Office or Adobe packages can be cloud-hosted, enabling staff to log in from whichever device they happen to be in front of, as well as access whatever documents they were previously working on.
In some instances, bad weather can actually increase an online business’s trading levels. This is partly because more people will be huddled indoors in front of a laptop rather than in the park or the pub. It’s also because sourcing equivalent products or services on the high street may be more challenging than usual. Although activity levels are unlikely to spike dramatically, providers of services that can also be obtained in the real world may wish to increase stock levels and listen out for reports of prolonged cold snaps. The latter can markedly increase demand for holiday bookings in particular, transforming a bleak midwinter into peak trading time for web firms selling getaways or activity trips.
One dilemma facing many entrepreneurs involves whether to take time off at Christmas. For a web-based business that can be managed from a laptop at home, it may be hard to justify the extended breaks that office workers typically expect. However, time off is vitally important for recharging the mental batteries after a long year. Since IT professionals and freelancers often feel the same way, it can become harder to resolve unexpected issues over the festive fortnight. It pays to have contact details for more than one person on file in case the guru who usually assists with outages and server issues is unavailable for the last two weeks of the year.
Perhaps the biggest problem faced by owners of online businesses involves their continuing reliance on real-world goods and services. An online mail order company still depends on road-gritting to enable its products to be delivered, while many clients expect pitches and meetings to be conducted in person rather than by conference call. Web-based businesses may be better insulated than most against the effects of winter, but they’re by no means immune.
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