As technology continues to change, it can be difficult to keep up especially for Small Businesses with limited IT budgets. Look to cloud solutions as a way to stay on top.

BizTech Magazine writes, “Technology is essential to any successful company, and as many small Businesses make their way on the journey to becoming big businesses, they find that optimizing their use of IT can be a major challenge. Many small businesses lack the IT skills and resources needed to take full advantage of technological advances.”

Have you found that to be true at your own company? Cloud solutions can give any-sized business the access to timely services that are scalable, ready-to-use and many times budget-friendly.  Cloud services allow your team to more easily tap into industry expertise and best practice solutions. BizTech Magazine highlights the three most common ways that small businesses use the cloud:

• Communications
• Productivity
• Data/Security

While communications and productivity may center around apps, a common data/security function that more businesses are looking into is disaster recovery-as-a-service or disaster recovery in the cloud.  DR in the cloud or cloud clustering containerizes your workload and enables the ability to treat disaster recovery and testing the same way data centers treat generators and electrical load.  It offers small businesses a reliable and affordable DR solution.  In fact, the Evolving Solutions team has written in detail about DR in the age of cloud infrastructure If you would like to learn more, check out our blog post.

Cloud can open up many opportunities for small businesses but it is important to remember that you must lay a solid foundation by first evaluating your needs to determine the right cloud solution.

If you are still on the fence about how cloud might help your business, we have a great opportunity for you to learn more. Join us February 11, 2016 in St. Paul, our team will discuss what is happening in the cloud industry and break down the questions (and answers!) you should ask to develop a solid cloud strategy.  After the discussion we will head over to the Xcel to watch the MN Wild take on the Washington Capitals. We invite you to register.