8 Most Important Questions to Ask Your Cloud Solutions Provider
As soon as a business owner understands the advantages of adopting cloud computing services, they will require a cloud solutions provider to migrate to the system. Since cloud computing is helping businesses manage IT operations seamlessly, more and more organizations want to shift to cloud-based systems. Let us clear some barriers that might come as doubts to help you choose a reliable service provider.
Questions to ask a cloud solutions provider to select the best
There are two evident drawbacks for people who only have the basic knowledge about cloud computing and plan to shift. First of all, they are not well-versed with how cloud computing works and the terminology that defines the operations. Secondly, it might be hard to find an appropriate service-providing company as they wouldn’t know how to differentiate their quality standards.
Thus, let us look at some questions you need to ask and the answers you’d expect to ensure choosing the best cloud solution provider:
1. Will I have control over my data?
One thing that might have been keeping you away from cloud computing till now is the skepticism regarding data control. The very first question you are likely to ask is how much control you will have over your data once it goes outside the oversight of the business. It would help if you got an assurance regarding the control they will enforce throughout the data lifecycle stages.
2. How do I create a cloud account?
A service provider might tell you that they will look after these aspects personally. However, it is better to allow IT experts from your team or yourself to look into such aspects personally.
A cloud provider will typically direct you to a dashboard to create an account for yourself or multiple accounts for your team. The cloud computing team will take you through the setup process to have a complete idea about how it gets started.
3. What are the types of cloud computing you provide?
Irrespective of how many new terms you come across while getting an answer to this, it is best to take a note and cross-check their credibility later. A cloud computing company might use more than one computing functionality like IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS. Please take note of these terms and the services to expect from their incorporation. Ask them what they recommend for you and why.
4. Where will my data be located?
After incorporating cloud computing, your data will be held in an up-to-date data center. It will ensure performance, reliability, and accessibility to the services. Ask the provider if they have a fall-back data center, as that will be an added advantage. A fall-back data center helps the cloud provider shift data from the primary center to the secondary center during a crisis.
5. Is my data secure?
The cloud security standards provided and managed by your solutions partner are among the most crucial aspects. You must ask about their security policies and practices to understand how safe your data will be. It would be best to have a background check regarding past breaches or data theft issues faced by the company. The size of the organization and their experience will also count to assure you on such an aspect.
6. What if I lose my data?
While asking for preventive measures against data breaches, it is also important to ask, “what if?” The answer will help you know the contingencies the provider will have when they lose data. Data breach or theft is not the only way you can lose data. You can also lose due to wrongly deleting it, files getting corrupted, etc. You must know the measures they take to guarantee data durability and how many backup copies they have of an incident where they did lose data.
7. Do you require third-party service?
Third-party services are common in cloud computing as licensing and agreements might be updated for cloud migration. For example, Oracle, SQL, and Windows Exchange are some of the common options cloud solutions providers use when migrating. It would help if you asked what these imply and how they might affect your operations.
8. Do you offer flexible consumption?
Many small business owners like to avail the flexible consumption license model to run short-term projects without buying permanent software licenses. If your cloud solutions providers offer this service, you will be able to add and remove services as and when you like. It is perfect for a business that wants to test the credibility of the provider before making a long-term commitment.
Final thoughts
The questions above will help you have the most valuable and crucial answers to improve your business operations. It requires security along with enhanced functionality. Thus, you must have the answers you expect to know if you are selecting the perfect solution providing a team for the job.
