Cloud computing has been around for a long time now. However, its usage has started picking up recently mainly due to fast and affordable internet services. In fact, about 68% of businesses in the USA now use managed cloud infrastructure services, up from just 29% in 2017.
However, there’s a good chunk of businesses that still don’t use it — about 32%. So, if your business is one of them, or has just started adopting cloud computing, then there’s a tremendous potential for growth using it.
Due to its numerous advantages, this trend of adoption of cloud computing is going to continue in 2021 too. In fact, the user spending on software as a service (SaaS) is expected to rise to $132 billion by 2022.
Image via Statista
But what are these advantages?
Let’s find out.
Advantages of Cloud Computing
Here are the biggest advantages of cloud computing for your business going into 2021.
1. Low Cost
The greatest advantage of cloud computing is the low cost. Whether yours is a small or large business, cloud computing is a savior when it comes to the cost of implementation and upkeep.
Cloud computing means that you don’t need to spend a large amount of money on expensive hardware and servers.
Instead, numerous web hosts can help you host your websites and other applications on their cloud servers for a subscription fee. This monthly fee is significantly lower than the cost of a dedicated server.
What’s more?
The best part about cloud computing is that these servers are completely managed by the web hosting companies. So, whether you need to host your WordPress website or an application, you won’t have to worry about managing the server.
2. All-Time Availability
Yet another important advantage that cloud computing offers is that it’s available almost all the time. Most cloud computing solutions offer a 99.9% or 99.8% uptime guarantee. This would mean that your website or applications would never go down.
Such uptimes would be difficult even if you’ve got your own hardware and server because it could go down anytime and getting it back up could take some time.
But that’s not how it works with cloud computing.
In cloud computing, the resources are divided across numerous cloud servers. So even if one server goes down, the others take up the load to ensure that your resources are always available.
3. Security
You’d naturally want to secure all of your online assets and this would mean that you’d need to have the best security possible for them. If you were hosting all the resources, you’d have to keep a dedicated team.
This isn’t the case with cloud computing.
One of the prime responsibilities of a cloud hosting provider is to ensure that all the assets hosted with them are safe and secure from cyberattacks. They regularly monitor the server security to ensure that all attack attempts are thwarted.
What’s more?
These hosts also keep their security solutions updated. This further ensures that your data remains secure.
And that’s not all…
Storing your data in the cloud also means that the chances of any leaks occurring through your employees are minimal as well.
4. Automatic Updates
As mentioned above, the responsibility for keeping your servers updated would fall on you if you used your own hardware. However, when you choose cloud computing, this responsibility falls on the web hosts.
These providers regularly update the systems to ensure that the latest security protocols are in place. At the same time, updates would also mean that you’d get access to the latest technology without the heavy costs.
And that’s not all.
You can also save a lot of time that you would have spent on IT updates.
5. Increased Flexibility
When you’re growing a business, you will have times when the demand for resources will fluctuate. To ensure that your resources work well, you need to ensure that you have the bandwidth to support this demand.
If you have your own hardware or servers, you will need a large capacity to ensure this. However, this capacity would be wasted during times of low demand. This can prove to be expensive for your business.
But that’s not how cloud computing works.
When it comes to cloud computing, web hosts allow you to scale your resources up or down based on your requirements. And the best part is that you only pay for the resources that you use. This way, you can save money.
6. Better Mobility
When you choose cloud computing, it makes mobile access easier. All you need to have is a reliable internet connection and you can seamlessly connect to the cloud and access your data on the go.
How does this help?
If you’ve got employees in different parts of the world, you can leverage cloud computing to give them access to data with ease.
What’s more?
This increased mobility also means that you’ll be able to collaborate better through cloud computing. If your team is able to access the resources from anywhere, they’ll be able to collaborate better too.
7. Detailed Insights
Yet another advantage of using cloud computing solutions is that you can get access to detailed insights.
There’s a large amount of data that you can collect about your customers, business, and campaigns. This data can help you derive valuable insights that can help you make better business decisions.
However, sifting through this data and coming up with these insights can be challenging. That’s where cloud computing can help. The right cloud computing solutions can deliver these insights to you so that you can modify your strategies based on them.
Final Thoughts
Cloud computing is finding applications in a wide range of industries. From website hosting to applications, there’s so much that you can do with it.
Through it, you can save money and ensure that your resources are available all the time. At the same time, you can upscale or downscale your requirements with ease. Cloud computing also ensures that your data is always secure with the latest updates.
And that’s not all.
You can also benefit from greater mobility and can get access to detailed insights about your business through it.
Do you have any questions about the advantages of cloud computing? Ask them in the comments.