Doing your business in the cloud. – That’s what many business owners and IT professionals are leaning towards today. Well, many analysts agree and say that cloud computing is the way of the future. The rate at which its usage and popularity among business owners alike has grown exponentially. So what’s up with all the hubbub?
Below we have listed a few of the facts that have indicated the growth of the industry and where it is planned to be in the future.
- SMBs who have embraced mobility have generated 40%higher revenue growth in the last 12 months compared to those who did not.
- Half of the U.S. government IT workers say that they have moved work to the cloud.
- Cloud computing is up to 40 times more cost-effective for an SMB, compared to the alternative of running its own IT system.
- 90 percent of Microsoft’s 2011 R&D budget was spent on cloud computing strategy and products.
- 60% reported cloud computing as their highest IT priority.
- Worldwide IT spending on cloud computing has increased more than 25 percent from 2008 to 2012.
- The Cloud Computing market is expected to reach $241 billion by 2020
- 26 percent of companies are planning a major cloud implementation
- Providers of cloud services saw a massive jump in personnel from 2007 to 2010. Cloud jobs went from zero to over 550,000.
- A new cloud server is added for every 600 smartphones or 120 tablets in use.
- An estimated 41 percent of the top executives in major companies around the world claim to use the cloud to streamline some portion of their business.
So basically, it is the way of the future. It is more reliable, efficient, easily accessible while still heavily secured, and all around just plain amazing in regards to how advanced the technology is.
Next, we’ll debunk some of the most typical fears of using the cloud:
Fear #1 – “It isn’t secure enough!”
Major cloud providers are aware of this fear. It’s an understandable fear because as technology advances, so do the skills of hackers. But Cloud providers are prepared and have some of the most comprehensive and advanced security systems in the world. Entrusting in the cloud, that is proven to work securely time and time again, is absolutely safer that placing that same amount of trust and important information in the hands of an in-house system, or an outside corporate IT team, for example.
Fear #2 – “The cloud isn’t reliable. What if I lose my data!”
If you’re anything like me, you’re a control freak. But when it comes to dealing with the cloud, there’s no way of getting around it, there is a sense of handing off the reigns to another entity and letting that control/manage all your data. But this is a good thing. It allows you to place your trust and your data in a reliable place, which gives you more time and effort to take care of other things. But what if you entrust the cloud with all your data, and then something happens to the cloud, causing you to not be able to access the data, or worse, the data is forever lost. Well there’s a solution to these types of issues. First off, the best of the best type of technology goes into the higher quality cloud systems. If the system, for whatever reason, goes down, they have backups, and then backups for those backups, and so forth. Also most cloud systems have set up contingency plans so that if your service ever goes down, it will come right back up without having to worry about putting your business on pause.
Fear #3 – “I don’t know if I can, or want to afford it. The cloud is too expensive!”
This is a an issue that a lot of businesses have. They initially believe that the cloud is something that will cost an arm and a leg. Quite the opposite. In fact, in most cases it is a nice trade-off. You can significantly lessen your capital expenditures, hardware costs, and office supplies cost and instead invest that money in a secure and reliable cloud system and just focus on paying those monthly operating costs. And just a word of advice, be cautious of cheap cloud services. There are plenty out there that are rather inexpensive, but that’s because they most likely don’t have strong data backup systems or contingency plans. If you’re going to invest in a cloud system, make sure it is one that can handle the workload. And it will be money well spent. Plus, there are many cloud services out there that cater to your needs, so you really will only be paying for what you need, rather than some set fee.