From enabling collaboration to engaging customers, winning new business, and powering operations, audio visual systems have become mission-critical for most organizations. And as this importance grows, so does the need to efficiently and effectively manage those systems. Here’s how AV managed services tackles that important goal while delivering other key benefits.
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Key Takeaways: AV Managed Services
- Audio visual managed services bring centralized management to AV systems, an operational necessity for most organizations as those functions become more numerous and complex.
- Key components of AV managed services include 24/7 monitoring, preventive maintenance and optimization, support for warranties and service guarantees, and a variety of customizable support options.
- Organizations that use AV managed services enjoy improved uptime, network stability, security, and resource optimization, plus built-in expertise without the need for internal sourcing, among other benefits.
What are AV Managed Services?
Audio visual managed services is a term that describes the process of bringing centralized management to AV systems like videoconferencing networks, digital displays, audio systems, internal broadcasting functions, and other key components.
And at a time when those systems aren’t just peripheral but increasingly relied upon by businesses as well as most other organizations, both public and private — from hospitals and hotels to classrooms to boardrooms — that task has never been more important.
In addition, as the functions they cover continue to expand, that importance will only grow — as will the need to efficiently and effectively manage and protect it all. And that makes AV managed services not just a convenience but a necessity.
> AV in action: Discover how a major university used cutting-edge AV systems to transform game-day performance
Why AV Managed Services Have Become an Operational Necessity
Used to connect teams, conduct meetings, impress visitors, boost branding, enhance security, and even power business itself, AV technology has become undeniably important to virtually every type of organization operating today.
Yet these AV systems are too rarely given the proactive support they require. In fact, most systems tend to be piecemeal and isolated — digital displays or video walls in a lobby that are disconnected from the videoconferencing tech in a conference room, all of which may be separate from the company’s PA system, security cameras, or other essential networks.
Given that they were originally installed on an ad hoc, as-needed basis, that lack of coordination is understandable. But it’s also an obsolete approach — and an expensive one. It demands more work from IT personnel, while providing fewer opportunities for system-wide optimization. Even worse, a reactive (as opposed to proactive) approach to monitoring and maintenance means a higher risk of system failure, and longer periods of downtime when that failure inevitably happens.
What Benefits Do AV Managed Services Provide?
A structured and strategized system of organizing all audio visual components into a single system, AV managed services are designed to overcome these issues, while also delivering an important list of additional benefits — such as:
1. Ensuring Uptime, Stability & Reliability
Audio visual managed services keep essential systems operating at peak capacity and free from disruption through a combination of remote monitoring, preventive maintenance, expert diagnostics, and ongoing optimization — all overseen by experts who can detect potential issues at the earliest possible stage.
> Meeting today’s challenges: Downtime has real consequences, from delayed meetings to loss of customers (and revenue). Managed services help take that risk off the table, and make sure that AV systems perform as intended, or even better.
2. Centralizing Management
By bringing all AV systems together into a single command center (or network operations center), leaders can more easily oversee and manage every component and each piece of technology. And that empowers them to make decisions from the most informed position possible, maximizing efficiency, eliminating surprises, and stabilizing budgets.
> Meeting today’s challenges: System consolidation provides more than convenience and transparency. It also replaces the chaos caused by lack of centralization, which means issues are spotted faster and repairs happen more efficiently, if they’re needed at all.
3. Optimizing Resources & Boosting Productivity
Managing AV technology on a patchwork basis across multiple locations is inefficient, and a drain on resources. But when those systems are centrally managed by experts, leaders can free up their time — and that of their IT teams — to focus on larger priorities. And of course, eliminating outages and downtime reduces the need for damage control from marketing and PR teams, while reducing meeting delays drives productivity.
> Meeting today’s challenges: At a time when most teams are focused on optimizing budgets, AV managed services offer a way to combine multiple applications into a single line item, transforming several unknown variables into one predictable quantity.
4. Delivering Built-in Expertise
In addition to freeing up internal IT staff from the need to oversee and manage the finer details of audio visual technology, AV managed services bring the highest levels of specialized knowledge to those systems via dedicated experts who are continuously trained, and who hold all of the necessary certifications.
> Meeting today’s challenges: Applying expert, third-party knowledge means maintenance is carried out more effectively, fixes happen faster, and the costs of internal specialization can be defrayed — and all at a fixed price.
5. Creating Consistency & Enabling Scalability
Managed services ensure the consistent performance of AV technology in each room, within every building, and for each component, giving users a more reliable and standardized experience. And on an operational level, that improves access, reduces errors, boosts performance, and simplifies support while enabling scalability.
> Meeting today’s challenges: From entering a new market to moving to a new floor to retrofitting an old building, consistency makes movement and growth manageable and much more cost effective, expanding what’s possible for many organizations.
6. Improving Security
Audio visual managed services can help protect systems by enabling system-wide security preparedness and greater oversight of every point in the network — and thus, fewer unseen bottlenecks, weak spots, and vulnerabilities to be exploited by outside agents.
> Meeting today’s challenges: At a time when AI tools are actively revealing weaknesses in even the most robust systems, AV system consolidation is an indispensable way to gain the complete oversight needed to adopt an effective security posture.
7. Promoting Future-Readiness
The specialized expertise offered by AV managed services also helps leaders anticipate and prepare for what comes next. And this, combined with the ability to keep systems updated with the latest tech and best management tools and protocols, helps avoid disruption and control costs while providing a more competitive stance as markets shift and customer tastes evolve.
> Meeting today’s challenges: The continuous improvement offered by AV managed services also provides opportunities to implement key technologies (like AI) at the earliest possible stage, to ensure ROI and gain the most competitive advantages.
What are the Key Components of AV Managed Services?
Each of these benefits translates into cost savings on an individual basis. Routine maintenance reduces the need for costly emergency repairs, while proactive system upgrades ensure optimal performance and return on investment, and so on.
To actually get those savings, though, organizations should ensure that the AV managed services provider they partner with can offer these four essential components.
#1: Proactive, 24/7 System Monitoring
Also called audio visual remote monitoring and management, or AVRMM, this component provides 24/7 tracking of all aspects of an AV system — newly installed as well as legacy — to ensure optimal performance at all times and catch any potential issues before they lead to larger failures.
> Look for a partner that offers remote diagnostics, real-time insights into performance, and proactive alerts, and can cover both networked and non-networked equipment.
#2: A Full Range of Support Options
The best AV managed service providers ensure system reliability by providing early detection and rapid issue resolution. And that requires a full range of dedicated support options, available on a tiered basis — usually beginning with a help desk and remote-hands options and extending through on-site visits, as needed.
> Look for a partner with a nationwide presence plus the ability to dispatch technicians on a local basis, as well as the option to customize support preferences.
#3: Preventive Maintenance & Ongoing Optimization
Two sides of the same coin, preventive maintenance means working to extend the lifespan of the hardware being used, while ongoing optimization means proactively finding opportunities for improvement — for instance, leveraging newly available software and protocols that complement specific equipment, environment, or operational goals.
> Look for a partner with the expertise to understand what technology is best for your business, and that can provide regular PMI inspections, firmware upgrades, system cleaning, and hardware check-ups.
#4: Warranty Support & Service Guarantees
Finally, an AV managed service provider should also provide warranties on the equipment it provides, and warranty inspections on existing equipment managed on your behalf. In other words, even older AV technology can and should qualify for service guarantees.
> Look for a partner that not only offers extended warranties on hardware and installation but also has the ability to customize coverage based on your specific systems and needs.
Trust Your AV Managed Services to the Experts
The bottom line? Audio visual managed services are no longer optional but mission-critical. And if you’re ready to discover the solution that meets your specific needs, you’ve come to the right place — contact us today to learn how our decades of collective experience can support your business or organization.
