Making Poor Cloud Computing Decisions for Your Business?

making poor cloud computing decisions for your business
Services Needed Network Support

In a recent article from Forbes called “9 ‘Worst Practices’ to Avoid with Cloud Computing,” one kind of mistake that comes up throughout the list is the tendency of businesses to make impulsive, ill-prepared moves to various cloud-based services.

Cloud computing has many advantages for small or medium-sized businesses, but the benefits of the cloud are only available to businesses that rely on expert IT assistance and make judicious, well-informed decisions.

What are some of the ways that businesses adopt cloud-based services with insufficient foresight and preparation?

Businesses may select cloud-based providers out of loyalty to a particular company or a sense of comfortable familiarity with some of their other services. 

For instance, a business owner who’s had a positive experience selling merchandise on Amazon may pick Amazon’s cloud services, even though the two aren’t related to each other; the fact that Amazon might be a reliable distributor of goods doesn’t necessarily mean that some of the cloud-based services they offer are best suited for the business in question.

Other times, business owners and employees aren’t prepared for what they need to do in order to successfully manage cloud-based services.  For one thing, they may not understand all of the service models (e.g. software as service, platform as service, infrastructure as service). 

And they may not have been trained specifically in understanding and working with these different cloud services.  (This is one area where obtaining the assistance of an IT company to manage your services would come in handy.) Employees may also be resistant to sudden major changes in IT that they have to accommodate and shoulder all on their own.

Lastly, businesses sometimes don’t give thought to how shifting to cloud-based services will specifically affect day-to-day business operations, including unforeseen costs and outages in service.

For making informed decisions about cloud computing that are best for your business, contact us.  Not only can we give you expert advice on which services to choose; we can also manage them for you, leaving you more time and energy to focus on growing your business.

5 Essential Questions to Ask About Cloud Servers

5 essential questions to ask about cloud servers
The Hype About Cloud Hosting

Cloud servers are an excellent option for housing data, increasing security, and having a backup system. They offer a sense of security should something happen to your regular database due to natural disaster, a security breach, other other issues. But what do you need in a solution for cloud based drives and servers?

When looking for a solution for cloud servers, you need to consider these five factors before deciding what you should do:

Does It Cover Disaster Recovery Solutions?

In this day of so much daily hacking and security breaches, it is more important than ever that you prepare for the inevitable. No one wants to think about it, but if you had to reconstruct much of your data, if important data was lost, or compromised, how would you handle it?

The ideal cloud servers should all address this problem of how to recoup necessary files and information if the system was temporarily shut down due to a disaster and it should work in seamlessly with your disaster plan.

Does It Offer an Extra Layer of Security?

 The ideal cloud solution should offer an extra layer of security to protect you. The infiltration into millions of Target customers’ accounts just a few weeks ago is proof that more security is needed to protect your customers and your business from security disasters.

Does It Offer 24/7 Tech Support?

Technical support is important and you should have access to this on a regular basis. Does the company give you access to knowledgeable professionals when you need them, even in times of non-disaster situations?

Do They Specialize in Data Protection and Storage?

Protection of critical data is essential and storage is also important to you and to your customers. Make sure the solution has enough bandwidth and storage capability to house all your data.

Does It Fit the Needs of Your Business?

 Each business is different, so think about how your business fits in with your cloud solution server and consult with someone about what your business needs to get the most out of it.

We are experts in cloud server solutions and in protecting and storing your critical data when you need it most. We also have a deep understanding of the need for extra security. Go ahead and ask us the above questions and see what we say. You may be surprised at our answers!

If you do not have a good cloud solution for your data storage and security plan, contact us.

Why Cloud Storage Isn’t Enough for Disaster Recovery

why cloud storage isn t enough for disaster recovery
cloud servers.

Signing up for a cloud storage service provider means you’re on the right track for disaster recovery planning. The next step is to avoid being like one of the many businesses that think that using cloud storage by itself is an adequate disaster recovery plan.

Although backing up your data on the cloud is an important step of disaster recovery, there are several other aspects to the planning, such as communication, employee assignments, and so on.

A recent Cloud Tweaks article discusses this common pitfall and explains why it can be so damaging to businesses. According to the article, there are several important aspects to disaster recovery planning, and cloud storage can really only be effective if all the other pieces of the puzzle are in place:

“Just assessing your technology environment is not enough. A comprehensive assessment should look at your organization from three distinct points of view: your technology team, the business leaders IT serves and the finance executives who have to agree to pay for it all. The true potential of cloud technology can only be realized by tightly aligning technology with business objectives.”

If a business purchases a cloud storage service plan to make all of their business continuity problems go away, they’re going to be in for a rough surprise when disaster strikes. Data loss is only one of the many harsh implications that stems from a disaster, and therefore data recovery on its own isn’t enough to fully restore business operations.

Businesses should plan and discuss a thorough disaster recovery plan for when the time comes. This includes how the business will be able to communicate with clients and customers, what the role of each employee will be, and how the business will restore it’s data.

This plan is crucial for business continuity and it is often complex. Business with no experience in the subject should considering outsourcing their IT services so as to not jeopardize their future business continuity.

If you would like more information about backup and disaster recovery, contact us.

Citrix Partner Service Provider South Florida

citrix partner service provider miami fort lauderdale and all south florida
Citrix Solutions in Miami and South Florida

9 Things You Should Know About using a Citrix Partner:

  1. 71% of small businesses need Citrix for mobile workstyles.
  2. The migration is fast and affordable and there is really no learning curve since Citrix brings you the applications you’ve come to know and love and use on an everyday basis to all your devices, be it smart phone, laptop, tablet, or desktop PC.
  3. 4 Corner IT can help you adopt these cloud services with a one vendor, one solution approach where everything you need from email and word processing to billing and CRM is provided in one easy to use desktop software.
  4. When it comes to cloud computing, Citrix is the #1 proven solution by over 1,500 partners. It is based on the same technology used by 99% of Fortune 500 companies.
  5. 4 Corner IT delivers those same services and benefits to small and medium size businesses at SMB prices.
  6. Citrix delivers apps and desktops to over 1. 5 billion devices around the world.
  7. 50% of small businesses think a Citrix partner solution is important to their business.
  8. As a SMB, you probably want to be mobile and have the flexibility to work wherever you want, on whichever device you want, but may lack the resources to do so. Citrix can do this and more at SMB prices.
  9. Call or message 4 Corner IT today. We’ll schedule a live demo to show you how you can get all this and more with Citrix. (954) 474-2204

CRM Integration: Developing a Relationship With Customers

crm integration developing a relationship with customers
CRM

Some IT companies take your computer needs and can make software applications dance like magic in front of your eyes; they almost make you forget that their service is not tailored to your field of business, and not to you. At 4 Corner IT, you are an individual and your IT answers are fitted to your personal needs. Like our website states: “there are so many different kinds of technological devices that it can be hard to pick what will be best for your employees. Have no fear, we are here to help.” Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is shorthand for the digital relationship that we at 4 Corner IT develops with you, and that you in turn have with your customers.

Say that you are a starter company with a really great new widget to sell. We will evaluate your needs. You are not just a clump of data to us; you are a group of people trying for the same goal, selling the best widget possible.

The size of your company does not matter, your goals do. All businesses can gain an advantage with CRM Integration regardless of size and small businesses can have an edge that will prove priceless in day-to-day operations.

“In fact, smaller businesses need to be more organized because of their size as every customer is almost irreplaceable, unlike larger companies that make up profits in huge volume.”

We examine the tools you need to get your widget on the public stage of the cloud and then help you stay at a maximum state of success. Phrased succinctly,

“A CRM helps you and your company manage your customers, your prospects and your sales. CRMs can be either web-based or stand-alone systems and can keep track of people, their relationships to you, whom they work for, what they’re doing, what they’re thinking about buying and how often they contact you, among an incredible number of other options.”

Today’s businesses cannot compete without a good CRM integration partner, such as 4 Corner IT. We want to work to keep your product or service on top of and ahead of your competitors’ inferior widget.

Get in touch with us and we will show you how CRM planning can handle the technological and data security aspect of your business, and let you make the best widgets of all time!

Take a look at some of our cabling services!