Are you considering moving your valuable data to cloud storage?
But do you even know where your business stands when it comes to implementing cloud storage technology?
Is NAS better than cloud storage?
If you’ve been thinking about shifting to the cloud, hold your horses as you need to consider several things before you make your move.
Storing all of your data digitally in the cloud is becoming a more and more popular choice for many businesses these days.
Check out our local storage vs cloud storage insight here.
However, before you choose a cloud storage vendor, you need to be sure to identify your needs precisely.
YES, it is true that cloud storage offers many benefits such as efficiency, security, and scalability that allow businesses to perform day-to-day functions quickly and efficiently.
Not to mention, one of the main reasons for the adoption of cloud-based storage solutions is cost efficiency compare to on-site storage platforms.
Many cloud vendors offer services to everyone regardless of their type or size and therefore, companies are increasingly attracted to adopt it as a way to streamline their business processes in agility and velocity as well as put them ahead in the competition.
Be that as it may, there can be some risks associated with moving your data to the cloud.
What if your cloud vendor goes bankrupt and closes?
Yup, it does happen, hubiC is one of the latest examples.
What if its technology fails, leaving you unable to access your sensitive data?
Therefore, you should be very clear about the exact needs of your business before moving to cloud storage.
If you’re thinking about moving your data to the cloud, here are 7 key factors you should consider before making your move.
1. How to move forward with cloud storage adoption for your business?
There are many ways to move your business into cloud storage technology and actually gain benefits from it. If you are a business owner, it is vital to know your reasons why you want to move your data to the cloud and what do you expect in potential gains upon utilizing cloud storage.
It also depends on which industry your business specializes in the market. After all, you want peace of mind knowing that your data is safe and is available at all times when it is connected to the Internet.
Here are some common cloud storage services that most technology vendors provide and how they can benefit your business.
– Disaster Recovery Option
One of the biggest and most common use cases for using cloud storage is disaster recovery and backup service. A lot of organizations utilize cloud storage to retain access to their essential business data.
Anyhow, if you don’t know what cloud disaster recovery is – it is a security measure service that backups and restores all copies of your data in a cloud computing environment. The goal behind this concept is to provide the business with a solution in case of a natural or human-made disaster.
Do You Know:
Nearly 80% of businesses lost around $20,000 per hour because of their downtime. This figure is conducted by Acronis Disaster Recover Survey back in 2014. I’m sure the number has gone up after 5 years down the road. We are constantly monitoring 20+ cloud storage server uptime performance.
There will be confusion as if it’s better to use online backup or cloud storage for disaster recovery? Again, it depends on your usage and preferences.
That is to say; there are now full-scale disaster recovery services available from small to medium-sized and large businesses.
So it’s really up to you to decide if you choose to utilize disaster recovery for your business. There is no harm in adding extra protection for your data.
– Cloud Document Storage
For the sake of keeping things simple, cloud storage allows you to save, share, and view your documents online in place on your personal hard drive.
Depending on the cloud technology vendor, each of the cloud storage works completely differently. However, they all operate under one goal – you can access your documents anytime, anywhere on any device.
It automatically syncs all of your documents so all the files will be up-to-date, all the time. It also allows you to collaborate on your documents and files with other people in the company and you don’t even have to buy an external hard drive, which will enable you to save on storage space.
2. Advantages of Cloud Storage
– Reduce Physical Storage Devices
If you’re considering moving your data to the cloud, one of the benefits is you get to reduce the number of physical storage devices in your office space.
Or expanding your storage if you are using a Chromebook for instance, you know how pathetic the storage in the Chromebook.
Cloud-based technology vendors have on-site servers that allow you to handle all of your networking needs from the cloud. As your business expands, you don’t have to worry about making additional hardware purchases or regularly maintain your servers.
By adopting cloud storage, you will reduce energy consumption and become an environmentally friendly business center.
You also, don’t have to worry about managing and maintaining your data. These cloud storage vendors will look out for you! They are responsible for the management and maintenance of the data center.
– Usability of Cloud Storage Services
We recently did a blog where we gathered 30+ best free cloud storage – almost all of them provide a usability drag and drop option to move your data between the cloud storage and your computer storage. Famous cloud-based data storage vendors such as Dropbox, Google Drive, and Microsoft OneDrive, all offer the same primary functions.
They allow you to save files in your clouds and retrieve them whenever and wherever you want.
Our Preferences:
If you’re curious to know what are we using most of the time, we’d go with pCloud. We are using their 2TB + Crypto bundle plan and our cloud storage comparison shows that they excel in comparing with competitors. Read our full review on pCloud here.
– Transmission Capacity
One of the benefits of using cloud storage is you get to avoid emailing your data files instead, all you have to do is send a web link from the cloud storage software to recipients via email.
Dropbox and G Drive offer this feature in their service, and so is pCloud. And it’s beneficial if you have to share your files with others regularly.
pCloud shows you how to make your download link stand out from the rest with Branded links.
– Accessibility
Again, one of the reasons many people choose to utilize cloud storage services is that your files can be accessed from anywhere at any time in the cloud as long as you have an Internet connection.
Cloud storage vendors are proud to be known for providing one of the best accessibility features. Most of the cloud storage services nowadays are compatible with almost every software and hardware.
– Cost Savings
These cloud storage vendors often offer lower prices. You basically pay-as-you-use for storage. It’s primarily meant to be cost-effective for all users.
Do check our list to know which cloud storage vendors offer the best price for your needs.
Lifetime cloud storage might be something you want to consider for long-term cloud storage.
Why we pick pCloud:
It was a simple decision as they offer the best price to performance ratio. Our lifetime plan cost only $175 for 500GB. Find out pCloud pricing details here.
– Scalability
If you do own a business, you will notice that your organization will go through a lot of changes over time due to workloads and business priorities. Therefore, a cloud storage system has the capability to be changed in size or scale to fit any business size.
In other words, a cloud storage infrastructure can easily expand your business growth.
Let’s move to the disadvantages of using cloud storage – if you want to know more, read our blog article on the downside of using cloud storage. Of course, there are always good cloud storage providers.
So, do check our list to know the best cloud storage providers for you.
3. Data Transfer Capacities
It is important to consider the consequences of bandwidth limitations before you choose. There are several cloud storage vendors that have specific bandwidth allowances.
If you surpass the given quota, there will be additional charges which can be a significant amount to pay.
A great example is the pCloud free plan offers 10GB of storage. The download link traffic is restricted to 50GB of data transfer per month. However, we have never exceeded those limits under normal usage, not even close.
There are, however, other vendors that offer unlimited bandwidth. For example, Apple iCloud, the best cloud storage for Mac provides unlimited bandwidth. It is essential to consider this factor when you’re looking for a cloud storage vendor.
4. Data Encryption
Many cloud storage vendors offer data encryption as part of their services – however, it is recommended that you should also encrypt your data at your end as an added security, before moving it to the cloud. We called them client-side encryption or end-to-end encryption.
You Need to Know:
Both sync.com and pCloud are having client side encryption as their security feature. Client-side encryption is better than server-side encryption in any possible way as not even the provider are able to read your files.
Furthermore, if your cloud storage vendor went out of business or goes bankrupt and closes, it is crucial to have a contingency plan to move your data to another vendor.
If you are looking for the top leading encrypted cloud storage, check out: Most Secure Cloud Storage Services on Planet Earth.
5. Understanding Your Data Storage Needs
You need to understand your business storage precisely, so you don’t over-purchase of service resources.
You need to pre-determine by considering your business’s needs for the present and future requirements.
Moreover, you need to look at your options in which the storage plan offers the best flexible layout to accommodate your data growth without affecting cost efficiency.
6. Industry Certifications
When it comes to choosing a cloud storage vendor, make sure that the provider is compliant with security and privacy compliance needs such as HIPAA and PCI.
You should also make sure that the cloud storage provider complies with new regulations such as SSAE16, which recently replace SAS 70, stated by Raghu Kulkarni, who is the CEO of iDrive.
According to Raghu, SSAE 16 is a significant audit standard that is crucial for organizations with financial data and public business sectors as well as other industries that specialize in data security and integrity.
7. Still Considering?
It’s really up to you at the end of the day!
A lot of people have chosen a particular cloud storage vendor purely based on its market reputation, which is true and an easier decision to make in some sense.
But before you decide on a specific vendor for cloud storage, you should absolutely do a thorough check-up on the cloud vendors.
Read our cloud reviews section to know which services suit you better for your personal or business needs.
We have done the heavy lifting and screen past a lot of unqualified cloud storage services, you are welcome.
Here are shortlists of our recommended best cloud storage services.
More importantly, ask questions about security before moving your data to any cloud vendor system.
Whatever you do, avoid these worst cloud storage at all costs!