What Is Geofencing? Why It’s an Essential Technology?

Geo-fencing technology is a location-based service that sets a virtual geographic boundary that is enabled to track and monitor activities of mobile devices in specified locations, triggering alerts to administrators when somebody enters or leaves that particular fenced area. Such responses are pre-programmed and can trigger text messages, send alerts, push notifications, track vehicles, disable or enable specific technologies and provide location-based data depending on how the geofence is configured. Read below to know what is geofencing.

Geo-fencing can exercise two types of virtual barrier setups:

1. Active geo-fence barrier 

Active geo-fences require users to use location services through GPS (Global Positioning Systems) or Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). 

2. Passive geo-fences barrier

Passive geo-fence barriers are the barriers that are always turned on. Instead of GPS or RFID, they depend on WiFi and cellular data and work in the background. 

What is Geo-fencing With CubiLock EMM

Geo-fence technology is widely adopted by businesses to improve performance, employee engagement, and customer satisfaction. It facilitates policies, applications, and services along with detecting and locking down lost or stolen devices. It addresses the challenges of low device visibility, control, and tracking when mobile devices deployed for pre-determined work purposes are exploited for unwanted reasons. CubiLock Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) offers a geo-fence feature that makes the process of geofencing and creating digital boundaries tremendously simple. It allows administrators to easily activate or deactivate policies when devices are outside or inside geographical areas through the CubiLock dashboard. The detailed maps used by CubiLock give businesses the ease to create precise digital boundaries from the CubiLock portal.

Furthermore, devices and profiles are automatically configured to business policies that enter the geofence. CubiLock allows businesses to leverage MDM GPS Tracking that enables as many geofences as required to track their corporate devices that are scattered geographically. It can be mainly utilized by businesses that deploy multiple mobile devices running on various platforms and locations, storing valuable and sensitive business data. 

What is Geofencing? And Benefits of Geofencing

1. Secure Corporate Data and Devices

Data breach statistics show that data is the most powerful acquisition today which is influencing more and more data and device thefts. Personal information has become a highly valued type of data to be targeted by hackers. Tiny mobile devices house humongous corporate data and information today. The data is no longer confined to the four walls of an office or cubicle. Remote work during COVID-19 increased data breach costs in the United States by $137,000 (IBM). This has increased the risks of device theft and loss causing financial catastrophes for companies. With CubiLock EMM software, you can get notified with the device lies outside of a virtual location. Thus, creating a protective shield against device theft or misuse of the device outside the designated premises.

According to the statistics, 70 million smartphones are lost each year, with only 7 percent recovered. Devices are especially at a higher risk of theft or loss when in transit or when they are constantly moving in industries such as the transportation and logistics industry, education institutions, retail industry, and healthcare. Mobile geofencing is incredibly prominent for such industries to lock up these devices and ensure the safety and inaccessibility of corporate data. 

2. Ensure Employee Accountability and Productivity

Geofencing functionality monitors and tracks devices which helps measure employee efficiency. It gives a sense of accountability to end-users when geofence-enabled devices keep a record of the log-in and log-out time of employees through the device. Devices automatically clock in when it enters a geofence location and clock out when it exits which keeps track of employee time and reduces the temptations of unproductive hours. 

This digital perimeter makes buddy punching phenomena and employee time theft much more difficult. Instead of relying on paper sheets or the word of your employees to know when and where they worked, geofencing devices gives a more honest and accurate assessment of productivity.

Also Read: What Is Kiosk Mode? Why Do Businesses Find It An Essential Feature?

3. Improve Management And Save Costs

Geofencing tracker is an ideal tool to gather valuable analytics and actionable data about the company and its set of resources based on-location activities. This information can help businesses refine their management and gain insight into increased operational efficiency and saving costs.

Likewise, a geofence location can help streamline processes for employees by sending alerts and notifications beforehand. This is helpful for workers to reduce downtime, maximize efficiency and be quicker in their procurement, shipment, and delivery operations. It prevents drivers from deviating from their routes which only adds up costs for the enterprise and causes unnecessary financial loss. 

4. Asset Management

In this day and age, where more and more assets of the company are android devices, mobile geofencing is an immensely helpful tool in tracking and monitoring their whereabouts. It keeps a record of company vehicles, manage rugged devices, smartphones, tablets, wearables, IoT devices, etc. Enterprises can geofence device around their warehouse or office and enable alerts when these vehicles or devices are taken away from the job site. 

Geofencing Technology: Use Cases For Various Industries

Holistically, geofencing technology helps all industries save time, money, and resources that are invaluable to any business. It is a security measure that also promotes interconnectedness among company branches, departments, teams, and projects. Every industry has something to gain from its usefulness, small-scale businesses to the big shots in the industry can secure their devices with geofence technology. 

It is directly reflected in saved costs, increased productivity, and improved management capabilities. Not having one can cost you in the long haul but having one can greatly benefit your employee’s performance, engagement, and efficiency  

So, what is geofencing for different industries and their verticals? 

Transportation & Logistics

• Makes it simple to keep location tracking logs of multiple mobile devices at once.
• Helps with route planning and keeps drivers and front-line workers informed about the best route.
• Ensures that shipments and deliveries are never delayed.
• Provides device visibility and crucial data such as moving speed, device health, and vehicle status.
• Improves customer service and employee reliability.
•  Allows immediate action to address any problems encountered by the field team en route.
• Eliminates chances of mistakes, time wastage, and damage to goods during transport and delivery. 

Also read: Importance of device management for logistics and transportation

Hospitality 

• Keeps track of employee whereabouts within the hotel. 
• Secures in-room tablets and smartphones by determining a virtual boundary within the room, building, or hotel premises.
• Eliminates chances of device theft or loss.

Education

• Makes remote learning more transparent for educators.
• Tracks student devices during field trips, outings, and volunteering work.
• Gives real-time information on the availability of staff or faculty members around campus.
• Adds accountability for students to use mobile devices strictly for academic purposes.
• Improves collaboration and connectedness in a virtual classroom. 

Healthcare

• Health personnel, departments, teams, and staff members can collaborate better by accessing the real-time location of each employee.
• Devices stationed at entry/exit points of the hospital or clinics can be secured from being stolen or lost. 
• Provides quick alerts to IT admins in case of suspicious activity, ensuring device and confidential data security. 
• Medical devices can also access and track the location of patients inside hospitals. (especially in  alcohol, drugs, or mental health rehabilitation centers)

Advertising

• Eliminates risks associated with placing digital signage kiosks outside.
• Wayfinders, information kiosks, feedback surveys, and product catalogs can be safely displayed.

With CubiLock EMM, the geofencing technology becomes flexible and simplistic for all business types. According to the business capacity, operations, and location, CubiLock is scalable as per your business needs. Besides, the time, effort, and costs saved from this technology, it provides real-time employee and customer information, valuable for any progressive business. The geofence feature is built-in with other powerful features of CubiLock that satisfy all mobility concerns and boosts the geofence capabilities of a company.