4 Cloud Tips: How to Improve Cloud Computing

by Michael Roche - September 16, 2020

As its name implies, cloud computing by no means guarantees “blue skies” for your business, so here are some cloud tips to make it so!

Just like computing from dedicated servers, The Cloud has its own set of challenges that require all-star levels of web development and IT know-how. And in the absence of expert systems administration and devops for your business, the results can cost you.

Of course, when cloud computing is carried out in the right ways, it can give you a massive competitive advantage. We know this because we help our clients do it every day.

Read on for four critical cloud computing tips that can help your business run smoothly and profitably.

1. Optimize your web apps.

This probably sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised at how much money small and enterprise businesses alike can waste in computing costs when their web apps aren’t up to par. Though the difference in your cloud storage bill may not be significant while operating an inelegant web app, CPUs, RAM, and required bandwidth can increase measurably and really add to your costs.

So, while cloud storage tips about freeing up space can save you a bit, the money you pocket there won’t be doing you much good if you’re losing out big in high computing costs. To keep the latter from getting too high, it’s critically important to have a team of engineers that can spot inefficiencies in your web apps and correct them. For small business owners who don’t have the resources to hire a full-time IT team, our Managed Cloud Services is often the answer.

2. Monitor – and improve – your services with your customer’s experience in mind.

Monitoring tools like Nagios and AWS’s CloudWatch have some truly robust features – it’s important that you use them to your full advantage.

The best systems administrator will collect metrics on more than just databases, web server processes, and CPU usage; in fact, with Nagios XI’s “wizard,” you can actually simulate different customer engagement paths on your website to ensure that nothing’s going awry from their perspective … In these customer-obsessed times, this is where savvy systems administration and UX can amicably collide!

3. Leverage ALL your cloud security features.

Most cloud storage solutions offer a suite of defenses — including intrusion monitoring, two-factor authentication, encryption, and often more — to protect you from cyberattacks. It could go without saying, but don’t skimp on these features. Use the most sophisticated cyberattack protection available to you.

4. Minimize your downtime with “multi-availability zones” and backup plans.

Downtime costs you money and, unfortunately, at one point or another every company has to deal with it. That’s why it’s so important for you to leverage the infrastructure of your cloud vendor to keep service downtime to an absolute minimum. Taking advantage of multi-availability zones that are built into the cloud’s infrastructure for your critical business functions will help you maximize your business’s uptime.

And let’s not forget, creating a recovery plan – and developing recovery point objectives (RPOs) – for how to get back up and running as quickly as possible can also help your business bounce back from downtime. Learn more about how to calculate the cost of downtime.

At Arcane, we take our own advice to heart, and are committed to keeping our clients up and running 24/7/365…

With clients like Rumble Boxing and Winklevoss Technologies, we’ve ensured their applications and website are ready to go at all times – no small task when, in the case of Rumble, you can have north of 150,000 transactions a month and a concurrent load of up to 8,000 customers.

Of course, for our larger clients, our solutions for enterprise hosting can handle upwards of 50,000 concurrent users and more than $1 million in transactions daily…so whatever your hosting needs are, we’ve got a Managed Cloud solution to match them.

At the end of the day, the important thing is that you maximize your business’s potential, and that’s exactly what we strive to help you do. Although this article is by no means a comprehensive account of cloud computing advice, the four cloud tips shared above are essential for businesses of all sizes, and can sometimes be overlooked.

Interested in Arcane’s Managed Cloud Services? Explore a selection of our managed cloud services plans.

« The Cost of Downtime: How to Calculate It

AWS vs Google Cloud vs Azure vs Rackspace »