Should You Be Moving Your Business to the Cloud?

In this day in age, it’s hard to imagine that there’s a single business in the US that doesn’t use the cloud in some way. From sharing the odd file on Dropbox, to using Google’s calendar services, many businesses are taking advantage of the efficiency and affordability that cloud software provides.

However, is it a good idea? And if you haven’t yet conducted any of your business in the cloud, should you start doing so?

The clearest advantage to moving your business to the cloud is the kind of accessibility you’ll enjoy as a result. Using the cloud means you can store your files in a virtual place, rather than in a physical place (or on a computer system that’s only accessible from a particular building, or even a particular computer within a building). This will mean that you and your colleagues will have access to all the necessary files and documents they need, from anywhere in the world, in an instant. This improves productivity, efficiency, and potentially even customer satisfaction if it enables you to provide a faster service.

However, while this is clearly an advantage, this kind of instant access is a double-edged sword. The biggest issue with immediate access from multiple locations is that it makes your business particularly vulnerable to crime. That’s because you’ll be entrusting your valuable data – perhaps your company’s most valuable data – to a third party. You’ll need to be confident that an external cloud provider can look after it properly, and this inevitably means placing a lot of trust in a provider’s understanding of hacking, criminality and the security measures you’re counting on them to have. This shouldn’t put you off using the cloud altogether, but it’s well worth having a plan in case of security breaches, as well as a plan regarding how you’re going to communicate to your customers (and perhaps even the general public) if a security breach occurs.

As you might imagine, running your business in the cloud does not resemble anything like dealing with the security of traditional, paper-based methods of conducting business, such as dealing with cash transactions, writing secure checks or keeping your customers’ details on paper. Instead, you’ll be trusting cloud providers to do the ‘heavy lifting’ where security is concerned, so do your part to make it difficult for cyber criminals to hack into your business, and consider taking out cyber liability insurance.

Another drawback of cloud based services is that they’re not always entirely reliable: websites go down, servers crash and complex programmes contain bugs. So, it’s inevitable that one or two services are likely to be periodically unavailable at some point in the course of running your business. However, you can mitigate against this by choosing cloud based services from trusted providers, and large providers too - they’re likely to have the experience, infrastructure and staff to remedy problems quickly, and possibly even compensate you if necessary.

So, are the concerns enough of a reason to disregard cloud-based services for your business? Many people would argue not. Service ‘uptime’, for example, isn’t necessarily any more worrisome than the amount of uptime you’ll have for your own servers, computers and equipment. In fact, keeping everything off the cloud tends to require paying for IT support (in house or via a third party), as well as regular maintenance and updates. And, as we’ve seen above, there are measures you can take to tackle security concerns.

There are more advantages to moving your business to the cloud to consider too. For example, moving your business to the cloud enables flexible working. It enables files, systems and processes to be accessible from anywhere in the world, which has the potential to reduce your business overheads, make your employees happier and more satisfied with their jobs and even make your business productive around the clock while your employees are working in different time zones.

Moreover, cloud based services are often cheaper than buying physical storage or software for a hard drive. That’s because cloud based services tend to be available on subscription based models, enabling you to increase the space as and when you need it, as well as adding and removing services as and when you need them. Ultimately, you’ll only pay for what you use.

So, should you move your business to the cloud? That’s entirely up to you, but it’s hard to argue with the advantages the cloud brings about.