As technology grows and blends itself with the business world, the cloud continues to expand and become more powerful. It seems as if everyone is tapping into cloud business solutions, which makes it tempting to do the same if you’re a business leader who has yet to migrate fully to the technological age. Whether or not you’re computer savvy, it might be wise to avoid ascending to the cloud right away. Cloud servers come with a special set of detriments and advantages that are worth educating yourself about. Here’s a list of pros and cons for you to consider before you make your next (and perhaps biggest) move.
What Does Switching to the Cloud Mean?
You’ve likely already heard about all the good cloud storage has to offer. It gives you improved financial savings, better management of both the company and its information and unlimited contact with your data for the entire company. However, with all of this cavernous space for storing your data, how do you get it there.
The first issue comes with choosing the right provider for your cloud space. There is a notable lack of control here that’s worth considering before you make the switch. Letting a cloud storage company host your data means they will have more control over it than you do, to an extent. No longer can you simply lock away your data within the confines of your office; the cloud company you choose to store your data is the one responsible for how secure it is. Cloud storage is just as fallible as the common hard drive. It is at risk of failures, outages and similar incidents that mean you’re no longer able to access any of your data unless you have it backed up elsewhere.
There’s also the matter of making this big move from a technical standpoint. How do you go about choosing the right company to store all of your data? Once you pick a provider, you’re stuck with them. Switching from one provider to another often proves to be a laborious task, meaning if you’re unhappy with your current provider, there are all sorts of hoops you’ll have to jump through to end their services.
Alternative Solutions
If these disadvantages don’t sound feasible to you, cloud business solutions exist for you to consider. If your company is on the smaller side, your “cloud” can be one computer alone, with the rest of the office PCs connected to it as one large storage network. You can also utilize small, free storage services, such as Dropbox or Google Drive. You can use these services to blend cloud storage and hard drive storage by picking and choosing which files to put on the cloud and which to keep within the confines of the office.
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