It can be a major undertaking for your business to move data housed in on-site hard drives or networks onto a remote cloud storage location. However, your company can reap tremendous benefits and stay competitive by doing so. Once you have made the decision to execute data migration to the cloud, following a few important steps will help facilitate the process.
Understand Concepts behind Cloud Storage
Before carrying out the task of moving data to the cloud, ensure that key parties within your business understand the premise behind cloud storage and the terms used to describe concepts related to the process. Utilizing the help of reputable professionals can help your business’ team learn about cloud storage before implementing the changes and allow for a more seamless changeover. For further information, you can see more here. There are many reasons why you simply have to rely on IT professionals when it comes to cloud storage, but the first thing that comes to mind is hacker activities.
Establish Needs for Data Storage Solutions
Analyzing and determining what your business wants out of data storage beforehand can help you choose the options you will want to incorporate into your cloud storage plan. Some key items for consideration include the use of public, private or hybrid cloud storage, accessibility to files, the type of software service, your company’s security needs, compliance with your industry’s regulations, maintenance services, and of course affordable pricing options. Based on your assessed needs, you will then be able to ask the right questions to select the best type of options that will make up your cloud solution strategy.
To complement your storage data goals, choosing the right cloud service provider is also of essence, particularly if your organization stores highly confidential information or has strict industry standards to operate within. In addition, with company’s increasingly doing work remotely, mobile capabilities in the form of apps are an essential component to look for. As your cloud service provider will become an integral part of your business, ensuring that you are confident in their service and capabilities is of the utmost importance not only to those in your organization but to your customers, as well.
Creating a Customized Storage Solution Plan
In some cases, a hybridized solution offering both on-site and cloud-based servers can be added to suit your company’s needs. Servers that exist on the premise provide quick access to files and active directories, and servers for print jobs, while still retaining useful features such as remote access available through cloud apps.
Mapping Out a Cybersecurity Plan
In the digital age, data is among a company’s most important assets. Protecting it from attacks and breaches in security is vital in maintaining your business’ operations and in complying to any standards your industry has to adhere to. Finding a cloud service provider that can provide the necessary degree of protection for your organization’s data should be at the top of your priority list when planning your move.
Specific features you will need to evaluate with your provider are administrative control, authentication of users, and data encryption services, and whether they are adequate for the type of information you need to secure. Of equal importance is determining how and where users access data. Implementing multiple layers of security can more effectively stop security attacks and data breaches and encompasses end-to-end encryption, firewalls, filtering of emails and content and analysis of threats. Knowing your data usage patterns can also tailor stricter security measures that allow for data access only at certain points and for multi-level authentication for when users access data through various entry points.
Provision of Training and Support Services
Management and employees can vary in the amount of expertise and knowledge they have in using cloud-based apps. Regardless of each team member’s experience, training and support made available by your cloud service provider is always essential. Basic training should ensure that staff members know how to access and update data, in addition to taking the necessary precautions to safeguard data when using cloud-based technology. Building greater confidence amongst team members can create more acceptance and willingness to utilize cloud-based apps.
Having prompt prioritized and real-time support, as well as the potential for support to be able to start a remote session are important functionalities to facilitate problem-solving and minimize disruption in business operations. Other modes of customer support such as automatic invoicing and billing are also attractive features to look for when shopping for a cloud service provider.
Depending on the needs of your company, when moving your business to the cloud, start out with conceptualizing your company’s data storage objectives and its effects on workflow processes. Planning out your security needs and providing training and support for your business’ staff members round out the processes necessary to enable data migration, which will inevitably result in helping your organization stay competitive in the marketplace.
