A Dozen Reasons Why Your Business Should Seriously Consider Cloud Computing

By Glenda Montiel, Cox Business / PRESENTED BY Business University / Member News / September 21, 2022

Companies of all sizes are migrating to the cloud, and you might be considering whether it’s the right decision to make for your own business. Cloud computing, cloud backup and recovery solutions, and cloud collaboration tools are some of the best productivity apps a business can take advantage of today. Which is a big reason why in 2022, more than 1.5 million businesses have moved to cloud hosting services, and 30% of all IT budgets are now being allocated to cloud computing.

If you’re still on the fence about moving to the cloud, here’s a dozen benefits of managed cloud services you can’t afford to ignore.

1. Lower Upfront Investment

You don’t have to make upfront investments to use cloud services. Since most are subscription-based, you only pay for the features and capacities you need when you need them. You don’t have to spend thousands of dollars on perpetual licenses upfront or purchase new hardware to support on-premise solutions.

With an infrastructure-as-a service, you only spend money on the computing capacity and data storage you consume. This helps turn CapEx into OpEx, which serves to improve financial health and agility.

2. Reduce Maintenance Costs

Since your cloud services provider takes care of updates, patches, and maintenance, you don’t need to hire or maintain a large IT team for these ongoing tasks. Plus, you’ll have access to the latest features to stay current with market demands.

You’ll lower your IT overhead and streamline operations without compromising performance and security. And since managed cloud handles all day-to-day maintenance tasks, you can focus your IT resources on business growth and other strategic initiatives.

3. Increase Flexibility

Cloud services, such as desktop-as-a-service, software-as-a-service, infrastructure-as-a-service, backup-as-a-service, and recovery-as-a-service, allows you to meet your business and IT needs whenever they arise. You don’t have to go through a lengthy and costly process to upgrade your IT infrastructure. You can improve operational efficiency quickly and access the right capabilities to meet fast-changing market demands.

4. Enhance Scalability

With cloud computing, you can quickly ramp-up your services to increase capacity and add users to support a surge in demand or business growth. For example, the desktop-as-a-service solution allows you to remove or add users in minutes to adjust for seasonality, respond to fluctuations in business trends, or deploy apps quickly to meet business requirements on demand.

5. Improve Data Security

It’s challenging for most IT departments with limited resources to keep up with fast-evolving cybersecurity best practices. Reputable cloud services providers have dedicated security teams to monitor their infrastructures and implement security patches to protect your data from the latest cyber threats. In fact, 94% of businesses saw an improvement in security after switching to the cloud.

With a security-as-a-service solution, you can take advantage of the latest security products to reduce the costs, risks, and complexity of implementing a comprehensive cybersecurity solution for your IT infrastructure.

6. Support Mobility and Remote Work

With remote and hybrid work becoming the norm, companies must allow employees to access corporate data and applications from anywhere using any device—whether they’re working from home, on the go, or in the field. Cloud services enable end-users to update files and access information in real-time so everyone can stay in the loop and make accurate decisions, ensuring seamless collaboration among remote and distributed teams.

7. Enhance Communication

Secure cloud platforms allow employees, vendors, partners, and customers to share information and communicate seamlessly synchronously and asynchronously and in different formats, such as audio calls, video conferencing, screen sharing, file sharing, and more. You can increase operational cost-efficiency, improve business processes, and enhance customer service by managing your communications from a central location.

8. Increase Productivity

Cloud-based applications offer the latest productivity tools to help your employees become more effective and efficient at their job. For example, with managed services for Microsoft 365, you can build-out a custom Microsoft environment with the right productivity tools to meet your needs. Cox Business also offers a dedicated end-user help desk and monitoring at a predictable monthly cost, so you don’t have to worry about hiring internal resources for support.

9. Improve Data Quality

A cloud-based system stores all your data and documents in a central location so everyone can access the latest information in real-time. The single source of truth helps maintain data consistency, minimize errors and delays, avoid version control issues, and track all edits and updates. You can break down data silos, facilitate data-sharing across the organization, and ensure data integrity and governance.

10. Ensure Business Continuity

Building business resiliency is key to minimizing costly downtime that could impact productivity, revenue, and brand reputation. When you use a cloud-based backup service, you can rest assured that your data is available anywhere and anytime while being protected against extreme weather, human errors, malicious acts, power outages, hardware theft or damage, and other unforeseen events.

With a disaster recovery-as-a-service solution, you can identify and protect both cloud and on-premises production environments to keep your productivity and revenue flowing.

11. Prevent Data Losses

When your business-critical files reside solely in local hardware (e.g., employee computers and on-site servers,) you could risk losing all the data permanently when the hardware experiences a problem. Data losses can be caused by viral infections, age-related hardware deterioration, user errors, theft, etc. Storing your data in the cloud allows you to access the information from any computer, so you’re not dependent on a specific piece of hardware.

12. Gain a Competitive Edge

Cloud services allow you to access the latest technologies and software features quickly and affordably to meet customer expectations, keep current with market demands, and stay relevant. Meanwhile, you can take advantage of the cost-cutting benefits to boost your bottom line. In fact, 77% of businesses say cloud technology gives them a competitive edge, with 16% believing that the advantage is significant.

Cox Business offers a full range of managed cloud solutions for every size business, including desktop-as-a-service, software-as-a-service, infrastructure-as-a-service, backup-as-a-service, recovery-as-a-service, security-as-a-service, Microsoft 365 and more. To learn how the cloud can benefit your company, visit CoxBusiness.com, or email Glenda Montiel at [email protected]