The cloud plays a vital role in every modern and growing organization. Being a transformative technology, the cloud improves efficiency and productivity and saves money. Several organizations are eager to benefit from the cloud and save on IT costs. A cloud-first business strategy is an appropriate option for them to adopt cloud-based services over their on-premises alternatives and achieve the desired business advantages.
‘Gartner analysts said that more than 85% of organizations will embrace a cloud-first principle by 2025 and will not be able to fully execute their digital strategies without the use of cloud-native architectures and technologies.’
Let’s learn about cloud-first strategy and how to take advantage of it.
What is a cloud-first strategy?
Cloud-first is a cost-saving business strategy in which companies migrate their internal processes to a shared cloud infrastructure. Here, organizations replace their existing software and digital platforms with an integrated cloud service provider. The key reason behind the cloud-first strategy is easy to access to high-end and secure cloud services at an affordable cost.
To have a better understanding of the cloud-first strategy, first, you need to understand the basic concept of the cloud. In a broad sense, cloud computing can be categorized into three essential tiers — Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS).
- SaaS: These are the cloud-hosted software applications delivered over the internet to the end-users, and users can utilize the licensed software on a subscription basis. Example: Microsoft 365
- PaaS: This refers to software development tool sets that facilitate application development at speed unmatched by on-premise solutions. This development environment encourages the development of applications extremely fast in the cloud space. Example: Azure App Service
- IaaS: This refers to virtualized hardware, operating systems, storage systems, and servers that are available online and facilitate the cloud computing system. Example: Microsoft Azure
In the traditional business approach, organizations have to purchase every component to continue the day-to-day work (such as hardware, operating system, storage, tools, software, etc.). But with cloud computing, companies can subscribe to the entire network.
Why do you need a cloud-first strategy?
There are multiple benefits to implementing a cloud-first strategy in your organization. The key benefits of this business strategy are:
Cost savings: When incorporating cloud services, you don’t have to purchase and maintain in-house equipment(hardware, software, servers). So, the Capital Expenditure (CapEx) and Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) reduce dramatically, and the overall IT expenses eventually drop.
It is the responsibility of the cloud service provider to invest in hardware and other facilities and their maintenance. Even if a disaster strikes, the service provider will be responsible for restoring the whole system to continue the services; its customers would not be financially affected.
Scalability: Organizations may not have the same resource requirement throughout the year—it depends on organization type, specific time and opportunities for a particular business. Organizations need to be agile and scalable to grasp the opportunities before they disappear and accommodate their seasonal business. Cloud services providers are always ready to provide their clients with extra resources and facilities. Cloud providers are also willing to serve their customers as they scale down their usage to cope with temporary drops in demand.
Security: Cybercrimes are becoming more sophisticated and complex over time, and it takes a lot of skills and effort to secure an IT system and protect virtual assets. Security is a critical aspect for cloud service providers and one of the main selling points. They implement advanced security solutions to keep their customers’ business assets safe and protected. Though cloud-first organizations are not cent per cent immune to cyberattacks, it greatly decreases the chance of threat invasion and data breaches.
Disaster recovery: Disaster recovery is one of the critical benefits of the cloud-first strategy. Most renowned cloud service providers use geographically-redundant physical server infrastructures, which are usually not collocated with their clients. As the storage locations are hundreds or even thousands of miles apart from the client’s location, the resources and stored digital assets are not affected by local natural disasters and regional outages. So, clients can restore their service promptly after a disaster and provide undisrupted services to their users.
Collaboration: As cloud services are delivered through the internet, it is most suitable for the current distributed work culture. Employees can access the server from anywhere and anytime with an internet connection. The importance of easy accessibility and virtual collaboration was explicitly demonstrated during the pandemic when cloud-first organizations could easily switch to remote work or hybrid models. On the other hand, organizations that hadn’t embraced the cloud yet, struggled a lot to remain operational as their offices closed.
How to Implement the Cloud-First Strategy?
Implementing a cloud-first strategy in your business is a process that takes time and effort. You need to follow a four-step migration journey to implement it.
Assessment: First, you need to assess the overall impact of cloud-first implementation on your business — in terms of architecture, mandatory application, security, and cost. Introduce the idea to your team, and conduct a brief pilot run to assess the practicability of the approach.
Migration: Determine the assets you are migrating to the cloud and the migration method depending on the application and data type. Next, you need to find the most secure data storage option (per your budget) and start the data migration phase to move your current assets to the cloud.
Cloud Access: Utilize the applications and tools provided by your cloud solution, and improve your productivity by automating business functions wherever possible.
Monitoring & Adjustments: After the first run, you can make adjustments to ensure the optimal benefits from the cloud solution and the highest return on investment possible. You must pay attention to performance monitoring to identify any issues is there and make adjustments accordingly.
Conclusion
When you identify that your organization needs a cloud migration and is ready for a cloud-first strategy, you must follow the proper steps to implement it. Before you go ahead with cloud migration, you must consider your business needs to identify the suitable cloud model for your organization. You can continue with a migration plan when you’re confident about your organization’s benefit from a cloud-first approach. Select a secure storage service provider, migrate the necessary company assets and data, and leverage the cloud applications to increase productivity. You can partner with a cloud IT consulting firm to help you implement a cloud-first strategy and enjoy a smooth migration journey.
