Nearly every business that serves the public — clinics, restaurants, waiting rooms, retail stores — offers guest WiFi. But there's a massive difference between "we gave out the router password" and a properly configured guest network.
What Proper Guest WiFi Looks Like
- Separate VLAN: Guest traffic should be completely isolated from your business network. A guest should never be able to see your file server, printers, POS system, or any internal device.
- Bandwidth management: Guest access should be throttled so one person streaming video doesn't slow down your business operations.
- Captive portal: A branded login page where guests accept terms of use before connecting. This protects you legally and provides a professional experience.
- Content filtering: Block inappropriate content on your guest network. You don't want liability for what people access on your connection.
- Automatic disconnection: Sessions should time out after a reasonable period to free up bandwidth and prevent abuse.
The Business Benefits
Beyond the obvious customer convenience, a captive portal can collect email addresses for marketing (with consent), display promotions or announcements, and give you analytics on foot traffic patterns.
For healthcare waiting rooms specifically, guest WiFi keeps patients occupied and off cellular data, which improves their experience. But it must be completely isolated from any system that touches patient data — this is a HIPAA requirement.
We deploy enterprise-grade guest WiFi solutions for businesses across South Nashville. If your guest network is still just the password written on a whiteboard, let's fix that.