In rural South Dakota, broadband connectivity can mean the difference between thriving and falling behind.
Ross Petrick, CEO of Alliance Communications based in Garretson, likes to tell the story of a business in eastern South Dakota near the Iowa border. Before Alliance supplied fiber broadband services to the community, that business struggled to do basic tasks. For instance, when credit cards couldn’t be processed due to poor connectivity, the business owner would literally drive the credit card reader to the top of a nearby hill for a cell signal. It made doing business challenging, to say the least, Petrick said.
Those days are over for that business owner and community, thanks to fiber internet supplied by Alliance, Petrick said. But rural communities across the state have similar stories of just how critical connectivity is to their growth and sustainability.
Currently nearly 89% of the state of South Dakota has access to broadband, according to US Census numbers, and most of that is fiber internet. This has happened thanks to state and federal grant programs as well as investments from telecommunications companies. Fiber internet access has all come from state and federal grants, telecommunications business investments and money from the Universal Service Fund. From 2019 to 2023, 26,000 South Dakotans have gained access to high-speed internet, says Dana Kleinsasser, deputy state director of USDA Rural Development in South Dakota.
Alliance Communications is one of 17 SDN Communications member-owner companies, and those companies cover more than 80 percent of South Dakota’s geography. The vast majority of that coverage area has access to fiber internet because of SDN and the network of its members.
Internet providers ‘driving’ growth in rural communities
Petrick and other industry leaders recently shared their rural connectivity stories during a webinar hosted by PorchLight, a Midwest talent recruitment firm based in Sioux Falls that “partners with rural communities to prepare for the 21st Century workforce.”
Shirley Bloomfield, CEO of NTCA - The Rural Broadband Association, said the numbers tell the story. Rural counties with high broadband adoption saw 21.3% higher business growth, 10% higher self-employment growth, 44% higher GDP growth and 18% higher per capita income growth, she said.
The internet providers in those communities “are the drivers of economic growth,” she said.
In rural counties with higher broadband adoption rates, new businesses start up and have a better chance of thriving, she said, while businesses without the benefit of broadband are less likely to survive.
“Rural communities with low broadband usage actually lose three to four businesses a year,” Bloomfield said.
Petrick says Alliance sees this in its communities every day. Businesses in 2025 rely on their online presence as much as they do their brick-and-mortar headquarters. Without the connectivity, they lose the ability to connect with their customers online and they risk losing business.
“Their online presence is becoming more and more valuable to them, and keeping connectivity is almost a necessity … just as much as keeping the front door open,” he says.
Petrick said services provided by Alliance have allowed entrepreneurs in the most rural of communities to sell their products and services and grow their businesses.
“It’s really nice to be the connection from the local main street to the world and keeping that connection up is important to us,” he said.
Businesses that benefit from widespread fiber internet coverage aren’t limited to traditional businesses such as hardware stores and local grocery stores. South Dakota is home to 31,000 farm and ranch families, according to AgUnited for South Dakota. Agriculture is the state’s No. 1 industry, making a $21 billion economic impact each year.
Smart agriculture encompasses a variety of technologies, from UAVs used to spray fertilizer to soil analysis robots to automatic irrigation systems. All are designed to make farming and ranching more efficient and all depend on broadband connectivity.
“We’ve seen a lot of interest and need there,” says Kleinsasser. “I’ve heard a lot of ag producers say they don’t have to go out in the barn every night in the middle of the night to check on their cattle because they have many other means of technology now to watch over that.”
Connections boost healthcare and education
Anyone who has lived in rural America knows that one of the most significant challenges in the past has been the lack of access to healthcare. Small towns with 600 residents don’t generally have hospitals and full-time doctors, but those days of healthcare deserts are becoming increasingly less common.
Thanks to fiber internet connectivity, communities are finding they can access the best of healthcare from their own small towns. Telehealth uses video, audio and other advanced technology to connect patients with providers anywhere in the country or world.
“Telehealth is such a huge opportunity for rural communities,” says Bloomfield. “Telehealth is an application that really allows the distance and the handicap of geography to really shrink in a rural community.”
Rural broadband is also a big boon for education. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the need for virtual education became immediate. To make that happen, fiber connectivity needed to be consistent and reliable. Communities across the state became painfully aware of the necessity of their broadband services.
Since then, more and more educational opportunities have become available thanks to fiber internet. Whether it’s teaching virtual classes on a snow day to students in K-12 or assigning homework that requires internet connection, educators rely on fiber internet to do their jobs.
Connectivity also allows people in rural communities to further their education without relocating and gives businesses the ability to offer continuing training for employees. It allows people to live, go to school and work anywhere in the world, which helps rural communities retain and even grow their populations.
Overall, when it comes to broadband connectivity, the positives are endless for a rural state like South Dakota. From healthcare to business development, communities benefit from the consistency and reliability of the fiber internet that their providers offer. It’s changing the way rural America operates and creating opportunities that were never available before.
Bloomfield says broadband has ushered in a “rural renaissance” where communities can “retain their best and their brightest.”
