Cloud Benefits Explained: What Your Business Needs to Know
If you don’t think your business is particularly digital or tech-heavy then you might think the Cloud isn’t worth thinking about. Your business is about making and doing things in the real world — what difference does it make whether your IT is in ‘the cloud’ or not? Here are the cloud benefits explained;
Turns out, it can make quite a lot of difference. How?
- Reducing capital costs
- Saving space and operating expense
- Improving security
- Better business decisions with the Internet of Things (IoT)
The digital and physical worlds aren’t that separate anymore. Though we’re not living in virtual reality like some people have predicted, and you’re probably not doing work on the scale of rebuilding Notre Dame with AI, at the very least you’ve got a website, email lists, internal communications, inventory, a CRM or order systems, and business admin like payroll and tax. You might have some remote work happening too. That’s all digital.
In short, what you need to know
Maybe everybody. Here are four ways it could benefit your business.
1. Reducing capital costs
Since every business does at least some things digitally, that means every business needs a server to help all the devices and programmes function. That server can be physical, on the cloud, or a hybrid. If you need to buy or replace a physical server, it’s going to cost you. How much it costs depends on your needs, but a business server is unlikely to be ‘cheap’. You’ve then got a depreciating asset that you’ll either need to replace in 305 years when it becomes obsolete, or expand when your business grows.
Hosting your server on the cloud means updates are software-based, and they take place as they become available. That means you’ve always got the latest version of your server. The overall cost is lower, more certain, and spread out (usually monthly), and because it’s virtual, your server can grow exactly as much as you need it to, straight away.
2. Saving space and operating expense
The monthly price that you pay for your cloud server is ‘all in’. When you’ve got a physical server on your premises, you’ve paid for the hardware, and then you have to pay to run it too. The power that even a small server takes to operate (and stay cool) could cost you thousands per year.
You’ve also got to put it somewhere. ‘Time is money’ they say, but they forget to mention that for a lot of businesses, space is money too. If you’re in manufacturing, for example, things like production or storage space can be critical to your margins. Giving up room to a server is a painful loss of square footage.
3. Improving cyber security
Some businesses don’t think about cyber criminals too much, because ‘Why would they bother with a company like us?’ The bad news is, if you don’t think you’re a tempting target, that means you’re an easy target. If you’re not anticipating an attack, you probably don’t have much in place to stop one.
The cloud is a quick answer to a lot of security weaknesses. It’s not impenetrable, but it’s effective. Your cloud provider will have managed cloud security measures built in, they will offer encrypted data storage, and if an attack does get through, their cloud backup means you can be up and running again very quickly.
3. Better business decisions with the Internet of Things (IoT)
Put simply, IoT is the connection of items and devices to share data. That could be boxes that report their own progress through shipping, parts or machines that alert the operator to a fault, or a room at a hotel that allows guests to remotely control their room temperature and that alters maintenance staff to issues.
There seem to be endless applications for IoT, but in short it could mean you have more information to help you make better business decisions. The cloud makes that possible. The amount of (remote) data to store and process means the cloud is the best form of infrastructure to handle it — a fixed server likely couldn’t cope.
Those are the cloud benefits explained.
Thinking of migrating to the cloud?
All of that sounds fantastic to a lot of business leaders, but the idea of actually doing it is enough to put them off. It can be daunting, but you can let someone handle it for you.
At Arc, we’re cloud migration experts, so if you want to know whether the cloud might be the solution for you, you need to decide what type of cloud to migrate to, or you want someone to handle the switch for you, get in touch.
We’re a vendor-neutral partner, so you can be certain that whatever we advise will be in the best interests of your long-term business goals. For a no-obligation conversation, call 01268 288100 or email [email protected].