How Cloud Computing Benefits Your Company

Adopting cloud computing services is a big decision for any business, regardless of how big your company is. Many companies can take advantage of the benefits of cloud computing, which can include a savings in resources, an increase in security and more flexibility for your employees and customers.

Cost

What your company spends on IT infrastructure can vary depending on how much data you store locally in your data center. Between the cost of equipment, such as servers and racks, space for the data center, power to run the servers and keep the server room cool, a high-speed connection and salaries for your IT team to keep everything maintained and running without a hitch, data centers can be pricey. Cloud providers help you keep these costs down because you're essentially renting all of the aforementioned equipment and services. Additionally, you won't have to worry about upgrading your hardware and software, which can be costly over time.

Scalability

Every business owner wants to expand, but with those growth spurts come growing pains. As your data storage needs increase, you need to invest in a larger data center. However, cloud computing companies make it easy for you to grow and not feel the pinch of a large investment in yet another server and rack. You can simply move over to the next cloud data storage plan and keep business going as usual. Similarly, if you need to upgrade applications your company uses, you won't have to purchase licenses and physical software for every employee's computer. If you make use of software as a service (SaaS), you only need to pay for the use of that software for each employee on a pay-as-you-go basis.

Support

When things go wrong with your data center   and this is an inevitability   you have to rely on your IT team to physically set things right again. If you use a virtual data center in the cloud, you get built-in support from the third party you pay to maintain your information. Alternatively, your IT team can have access from their own laptops or mobile devices to fix the issue.

Automation

Upgrades are a necessary part of technology. As improvements are made to applications, languages, operating systems and infrastructure, downtime is expected as those upgrades and patches are applied. When you host your data center, your IT team has to schedule around your normal business hours to make these changes. Cloud computing companies make it easier for you to schedule maintenance and upgrades without having to disrupt your employees' or customers' schedules. Automatic updates can be slated for the middle of the night or a weekend, or any other time that's suitable for your business.

Security

Regardless of how tight security is at your private data center, if it isn't your business' expertise, you're unlikely to be doing a better job than a cloud service. Cloud providers are in the business of storing data securely, so they're expected to offer the best encryption and security available. Additionally, data storage companies often offer daily, weekly or monthly backup options so that in the case of hardware or software failure, you can quickly and easily recover your data and apps.

As cloud services improve, more businesses are moving away from the traditional method of data storage and opting for the cost-effective and convenient option of virtual data storage. Plenty of plans exist to meet your company's specific needs, so you don't have to pay for more than what you need, or worry that your company will outgrow what's already available.

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Colocation or Cloud Services: What's the Best Solution for Your Business?

The business blueprint has changed many times over the last few decades thanks to an ever-changing tech world, and it continues to morph, especially in cloud computing. Small businesses and large enterprises are reimagining how they store data and applications because cloud providers are more affordable and more convenient for employees and clients to access said data and apps.

However, some companies may be hesitant to move sensitive information, such as personally identifiable data or proprietary information, to a public cloud. For those companies, colocation services could be a viable option that allows them to keep their equipment, but it is hosted and maintained by a third-party company.

A compromise also exists that embraces new technology but allows companies to maintain some of the traditional methods of data storage.

Pros & Cons of Cloud Providers

Plenty of benefits exist when you choose to store your data in the cloud. Some concerns with transferring everything to the cloud still persist, though.

Pros

It is likely that switching over from a traditional method of data storage saves your company money in the long run. Your tech team won t need to upgrade hardware and software to keep your sensitive information on lockdown because it will be handled by the third-party cloud service. Cloud data storage means you won t have to keep a data center on your premises, which also saves you money in power consumption, space, equipment and high-speed connection.

Aside from cost, there s a huge convenience to using cloud computing services. Your employees and clients can access your company s data and applications from any computer around the world. In the office, your high-speed connection can go directly to your employees rather than your data center.

Choosing a cloud data solution also means your business can expand without your company having to invest in bigger servers or more personnel to keep everything running seamlessly. Expansion isn t a big deal in the cloud   the provider handles that for you.

Cons

In spite of the many benefits of cloud computing, some concerns remain, such as security. The idea of your sensitive information held in a nebulous cloud can be scary. Relinquishing control over the status of servers and any outages that could occur is difficult for some companies and their IT teams.

Privacy issues are also of concern for some companies. Under the U.S. Patriot Act, the government may have access to your data, but this can be solved by using encryption. Although cloud data storage seems frugal to start, future costs as your company grows are unpredictable, and it s difficult to compare cloud storage costs versus traditional methods.

Pros & Cons of Colocation Providers

Many businesses are looking into a different solution for data and app storage. You can move your equipment to a colocation provider and trust a third-party IT management company to handle your data center.

Pros

Instead of keeping an on-premises data center, you can move your servers to another location that your company shares with other businesses. A third-party company can offer lower rates because you provide the equipment and essentially rent the space. You can keep your proprietary information on these servers, if you prefer, and move applications that are less sensitive to the cloud.

A colocation solution can also benefit your company by allowing you to reduce your IT management. Your IT employees won t need to be on call to fix any server issues   the third-party company takes care of outages.

Your company won t have to keep up with capacity changes because the colocation company handles that, and because this is all the company handles, expansion is at the forefront of their business plan.

Cons

Location is important when choosing a colocation service. Although your data center can be managed by a third-party company, your IT team may need access to your servers, so you need to be sure the company is local.

Although cost is a pro, it could be a con, as well. While keeping your private data center in a shared space can save you money in many ways, maintenance and monitoring is a cost that is additional to simply renting the space. And if your company grows, you may need more equipment   which is an added cost.

Another solution is a blended one   colocation services along with cloud computing services. You can split your data between the two instead of hosting a private data center. This is cost-effective and convenient for your company and employees.

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Domain Names for Your Small Business

The Internet is the ultimate gateway to the world of available sales and marketing.  Small business owners now have the same ability to compete with their larger competitors like never before by simply maintaining a strong web presence and registering a memorable domain name.

Many online users may not realize it; however, access to the Internet is gained and controlled primarily by domain names.  As a small business owner, once you’ve developed a functioning and effective website, in order to reach the public you must use a domain name.

Domain Name Extensions

Most domain names are directly related to the company, product, service or purpose of the website. It’s intentional, as not only do you want your domain name to be recognizable to you, but also your customers.  Depending on the type of company you operate helps in determining part of the domain’s name.  Most companies will have a domain name that ends in with the .com extension.  Others may include: .gov, .net, or .org.  Regardless of the extension, the domain name should be used on all distributed company advertising material.

Before you secure a domain name for your company, you should first give it some careful thought.  You want something that’s easy to remember. Companies should consider a domain name that’s easy to spell, fresh and catchy.  If you’ll notice, most large websites have a single word domain name.  Remember you’ll be responsible for reciting it to customers, possibly over the phone, so complicated names can become tedious, and customers grow frustrated when they can’t access your website.

Domain Name Marketing

Once you have your domain name, then you must incorporate it into your marketing.  The website is only as useful as the traffic it generates to a specific site. Your website design should also include online marketing features such as tags for search engines, listed domain name(s), as well as key phrases designed by you or your SEO guru team.  To increase market saturation, you can advertise with search engines, networking sites, or any related websites.

As a small business owner, you may also opt to utilize your domain name in your existing advertising material. Business cards, letterhead, flyers, radio and television are all great marketing mediums to assist individuals with domain name recognition.  Once your domain name has a reputable and established recognition, online visitors will quickly begin trickling into your website.

Domain names are the link between your small business’ website and your customers, so choose wisely and advertise competitively!

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Variations of Web Hosting and its Benefits

Web hosting is all about making a web page available through the World Wide Web, with an internet connection, for anyone across the world to access. As it is become a necessary need in today’s world, these services are offered for free under many circumstances.

There are several types of website hosting, as each individual’s requirements will vary.

Free Web Hosting

There is the free web hosting, where the user gets to host the web page absolutely free of cost. These companies will be powered through advertisements. Most of the free hosting services will go to the personal web pages as they may not need too much data base support.

However, if you have a professional site, you should avoid free hosting entirely. The disadvantages of free services:

● No domain names.
● Banner ads on your site, pop ups or pop unders.
● Limited software additions.
● Limited ability to expand or move files.
● No databases to run useful software including blogging tools.
● Poor security.
● No or limited technical support.

Shared Hosting

Next we can look at the shared hosting, where a web site will be hosted on the same server as many other sites. It may number from a hundred to many thousands. The server resources will be common in this case. If you have a sudden spike in traffic, your site may be at risk for suspension due to increased resource usage. In contrast to this there is the clustered hosting, where several servers will host the same web page. Most shared hosting companies use a Linux platform, some offer a Windows option.

The advantages include:

● Low cost per month, often discounts are available if paid annually.
● A variety of add on programs and tools to optimize your site.
● Your own domain and domain email,
● Adequate customer support

Dedicated Hosting

Dedicated hosting provides greater flexibility than shared hosting, since the customer generally retains control over the hosting environment and choice of operating system. The provider, however, remains responsible for hardware and network administration. Most people who know what they need to know about web hosting, will go in for this option.

This option suits large companies and high traffic web sites. The client can use multiple domains and host additional sites on one server. The amount and type of software solutions to install are virtually unlimited. The disadvantages are that you need to have a much higher skill set and that is the most expensive option.

Managed Hosting

Then there is the managed web hosting – a more advanced type of dedicated server hosting. In a managed hosting environment, the provider owns the data centers, the network, the server and other devices, and is responsible for deploying, maintaining and monitoring them.

The customer retains full control of their operating systems and applications. This balance of responsibilities allows for levels of security, scalability and uptime that far exceed basic dedicated hosting and other hosting options.

Virtual Private Server (VPS)

VPS is a shared hosting plan that acts like a dedicated one. Virtual private servers share one physical server but act like multiple, separate servers. Each VPS shares hardware resources but they are allocated a dedicated slice of the computing resources.

The problem of having your hosting neighbors bring down your website is eliminated with this hosting, while the cost is lower than that of a dedicated server.

Collocation Hosting

The most expensive web hosting is the collocation type. The physical space will be provided by the hosting company, and the users will own the colo servers. Only certain facilities will be provided for the user with this hosting like the Internet, and storage. This option requires knowledge and skill. It is used for larger businesses with a dedicated IT department or small web host providers.

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Difference between Shared and Dedicated Servers

If you have a medium sized business, choosing between a shared and dedicated web hosting plan can be a big challenge. Things can become confusing because you will have to decide between your current and future need. In an age where every web hosting provider claims “unlimited everything”, it can become even more perplexing to make the right choice.

In this guide, we will touch upon each aspect of shared and dedicated web hosting plans so that it will become easier for you to make the right decision. We will distinguish between the two types of hosting plans according to their features.

1. Bandwidth & Disk Space

In the hosting industry the word “bandwidth”means the traffic used by services such as cloud hosting and dedicated server over the course of a month. To calculate a client’s bandwidth needs, most providers estimate the amount of data that a company moves in and out of the network per month for a specific server.

Shared Hosting:

As already mentioned in the beginning, most web hosting companies will advertise their shared plans with “unlimited” bandwidth and disk space. But the fact is that this web hosting plan will always have a limit. In other words, you can’t use the “unlimited” space in one go. You can use an unspecified amount at first, and then add more. But only web host gets to decide how much you can use each time. Ask your host about the “soft limit” and make your decision based on the volume of traffic you are receiving.

Dedicated Hosting:

If you have a website that receives massive volume of traffic, dedicated hosting is the right choice. Some web hosts can provide you actual “unlimited” bandwidth and disk space.

2. Performance

Shared Hosting:

The better the performance of your website, the better will be your visitors’ user experience. Because a shared hosting plan will always have limited resources, you could never be certain about your site’s performance. Imagine a situation where you website receives average traffic. Another user on the shared server runs a SEO campaign and experiences a massive surge in traffic. The shared server will utilize more of its resources to support that user’s traffic, thus affecting your website’s performance.

The result will be that your web pages take longer time to load, thus causing annoyance to your thousands of visitors. If it is your website that has experienced an unprecedented surge in traffic, some shared hosting providers may even penalize you or charge you more for consuming additional bandwidth.

Dedicated Hosting:

If you have a dedicated web hosting plan, you will never have to worry about another user’s traffic. The server will be entirely dedicated to your site and you could experience any amount of traffic without having to worry about downtime. So if you have a decent amount of traffic and you want to give a great experience to your visitors, dedicating hosting is the ideal choice for you.

3. Security

Shared Hosting:

The basic “mechanism” of shared hosting makes it less secure than a dedicated hosting plan. It is because your website will be on a server which is shared by many other websites. A single erroneous script running on the server could cause the server to crash. You could never know what kind of other websites are hosted on your shared server.

Dedicated Hosting:

There is more security and reliability of having your website running on a dedicated server. A typical dedicated hosting allows running almost all types of scripts and software. Besides, the web host will always be monitoring your dedicated server to ensure that your site is running smoothly. It is one of the reasons why you will be paying more to them.

4. Control

Shared Hosting:

Shared hosting is for those website owners who don’t have the knowledge to manage and control everything. But this lack of sufficient control comes with its own drawbacks. There are limitations on the kind of scripting language and types of files that can be used. But if you don’t want advanced applications and features to run on your site, shared web hosting could be an economical option.

Dedicated Hosting:

If you want to have total control over the server resources, you should choose dedicated hosting. On the other hand, if you need more resources for a large website, you will be choosing dedicated web hosting. But you should have some technical knowledge and experience to manage such an account. It allows you to run almost any type of software and supports various types of scripting languages. In other words, you could customize the environment based on your specific needs. In special cases, the webmaster may also get the root access code to their dedicated server.

Managing a dedicated hosting plan will require advanced knowledge. If you can’t do it yourself, you will have to maintain a team that can or you can choose “managed dedicated” hosting. In this case the web host will manage your dedicated hosting plan for an additional fee.

Also Read: Web Hosting and its Types

5. Cost

Shared Hosting:

Affordability is one of the biggest reasons why so many professionals and small businesses choose shared web hosting plans. Many web hosts offer “dirt cheap” prices for shared hosting plans, but they will typically come at a cost – poor performance. Still, many web hosts will be able to offer you reliable shared hosting plans at reasonable prices.

Dedicated Hosting:

There are all sorts of advantages of using dedicated web hosting. But it comes at a very high cost. Usually, minor technical issues are resolved for free, but if the server has any major problems, you may be required to pay the web host on an hourly basis. In simple terms, dedicated web hosting is for premium users, who have a large website backed by a large organization.

The hosting type that you choose will depend solely on your needs, budget, server and website needs, and the amount control that you desire. So, to make a wise decision, do more researches, consult those highly technical savvy people. Remember that a good and smart decision will determine your online success.

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Cloud Hosting vs VPS Hosting

So what exactly is the difference between a Cloud Hosting plan and a Virtual Private Server (VPS) ?

It's a bit tricky because the term "cloud" has been widely over-used, misused and abused by many... However, all serious web-hosting providers will consider the difference like this:

VPS Hosting

A VPS is a virtual machine running on a single dedicated server. That servers is shared between a number of VPS virtual machines. It means that a part of the CPU time, a part of the RAM and a part of the disk space are allocated to your VPS. If the server is shut down, all the VPS virtual machines on that server go offline.

Cloud Hosting

With Cloud Hosting, you also have a virtual machine, but it is NOT hosted on a specific single dedicated server. On the contrary, your virtual machine can be spun up on any dedicated server of the hosting company's infrastructure, depending on availability. In case a server goes down, all the virtual machines if was running can be spun up again very quickly on a different server.

One particularity of this is that if you need several identical servers with load-balancing in order to handle traffic surges, Cloud hosting can quickly (almost instantly) spin up extra instances of your servers, as many as you need and as long as you need, then spin them down again when they are no longer used. You often get billed by the hour for each running instance.

How do they compare?

Technically, a VPS infrastructure is simpler and easier to set up than a Cloud infrastructure. Therefore VPS hosting will typically be cheaper than Cloud hosting.

However with VPS hosting you may run into limits that will make you prefer Cloud hosting:

● With VPS you can grow the specs of your virtual machine, as long as there is space on your sever (depending on other clients). After this, tech support will need to move your virtual machine to another server with more available resources. This may take days or weeks. Sometimes it's not possible at all. With Cloud the same operation will only take minutes or maybe even seconds, because the infrastructure is built for automatically moving VMs from server to server.
● With VPS, if there is a hardware issue with your server, you get downtime while the server gets serviced. With Cloud, if there is a hardware issue, you get moved to another server and you barely notice the downtime.
● Cloud allows you to scale up and down the number of virtual machines you may be running simultaneously. VPS is a reserved slot on a server, with no easy up and down scaling.

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Hosting Types - The Difference between Shared VPS and Dedicated Web Hosting

All websites function through a web hosting service, which is a service that enables individuals and organizations to make their websites public through the World Wide Web. A web host is basically a company that rents out space on a web server for owners to make their websites accessible on the internet.  While not all web hosts own their own servers, many of them rent them from larger companies with access to data centers, or collections of servers, and in turn rent these servers to other companies or individuals.

There are several kinds of web hosting. But we’ll discuss three of them here: Shared web hosting, Virtual Private Server (VPS) hosting, and dedicated web hosting.

Shared Web Hosting

A shared web hosting service can be compared to living in an apartment complex. Just as different individuals and families live in their own apartments in a building, in a shared web hosting service, many websites reside on one web server. 

Understandably, this is the most economic form of hosting. It is ideal for simple websites that do not contain too many features and those that are not likely to see much traffic. A shared web hosting service is handled by a system administrator.

The suitability of this depends on your preferences. It can be useful if you do not want to handle the technical side of the site, but it can be troublesome ifyou require more control of your site. Server management, installation of server software, security updates, and technical support are handled by the service provider.

A shared web hosting service can also be inappropriate if you require extensive software development outside of what the hosting provider supports. It has usage limits and must have extensive reliability features in place. Another disadvantage of this service is that since many websites share the same server, if one website is involved in any unethical action or spamming, the entire IP address can get blacklisted. 

Dedicated Web Hosting

A dedicated web hosting service can be compared to living in an independent residence. This is a type of service in which an entire server is occupied by a single website. As a result, the owner of the website has full control over the server. There are no limitations on bandwidth and disk space. 

In a shared web hosting service, an administrator handles the setup and technical operation of the server. For a dedicated server, there comes a host of technical skills that need to be there. There is an added need to set up, administer and manage the server, however, with new and fully dedicated hosting plans one can avail this at a bit of higher price.

In addition dedicated hosting services offer high performance, email stability, security, and control. Such a service is ideal for websites that receive high traffic and make the use of extensive features. 

Online shopping portals typically make use of dedicated web hosting.Unlike with using a shared web hosting service, there is a lesser chance of getting blacklisted by using a dedicated web hosting service as you are in full control of the server. 

Virtual Private Server (VPS) Hosting

VPS Hosting is a type of hosting that falls in between shared web hosting and dedicated web hosting. It can be compared to living in a condominium, where you share things on the property, but you are ultimately responsible for the maintenance of your property inside the condominium. It offers the use of extensive disk space and bandwidth.

Such a hosting service is ideally used by a company with resource heavy applications and secured data. Like in the case of dedicated web hosting, VPS hosting is used by websites that experience a lot of traffic. However, it is cheaper than using a dedicated web hosting service as the server is still shared by multiple users. Although you can configure the server any way that you want, you would still need a dedicated system administrator to take care of your server.

The following table summarizes how each hosting service is different from the other:

Shared Web Hosting	Dedicated Web Hosting	VPS Web Hosting
➣ A server is shared by multiple websites ➣ It offers limited bandwidth and disk space. ➣ It is comparatively cheap due to shared costs. ➣ It does not require the website owner to have much technical skill. ➣ High traffic can slow down the server ➣ It offers the least control among the three types. ➣ It is the least secure among the three types.	➣ A server is dedicated to just a single website. ➣ It offers high bandwidth and disk space. ➣ It is quite expensive because of no shared costs. ➣ The website owner will need to have technical skills as he has full control of the server. ➣ The server is designed to handle high traffic. ➣ It offers high control. ➣ It offers high security.	➣ A server is shared by multiple websites. ➣ It offers high bandwidth and disk space. ➣ It is quite expensive but is cheaper than a dedicated web hosting service. ➣ It does not require the site owner to have much technical skill but requires a system administrator. ➣ The server is designed to handle high traffic. ➣ It offers high control. ➣ It offers high security.

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