Microsoft Azure, like many other cloud service providers, have built their billing and subscription models on a pay-per-use basis, i.e., if you use one hour of CPU time you pay for the hour you have consumed. No more, no less.

This basic economic principle forms the foundation of most public cloud services. However, the implementation of this simple concept can be quite complex and intricate. This is especially true if the cloud provider offers a wide variety of cloud services which utilize computing resources in different ways as is the case with Microsoft Azure.

Azure solutions are built on multiple standalone services

The key concept to understand when determining Azure pricing is that each solution is comprised of a number of different services and building a solution price entails combining the cost of these multiple services.

If we take a web application as an example, it may not only consist of a web app service and a database; it may also include some form of static storage and perhaps need a few advanced networking services. All are priced individually by Azure, so understanding the full scope of the services your solution consumes will help you determine its ultimate cost.

One size does not fit all – each Azure services is priced differently

Each service on Azure is priced as a measured service. However, not all services use the same set of computing resources, so the hourly cost of each service is calculated differently.

For example, pricing for virtual machines is calculated by summing the individual unit prices for the virtual CPUs, memory, storage, and networking services consumed. Databases, on the other hand, are priced according to what Microsoft terms a Database Transaction Unit (DTU) which is a bundled measure of computing, storage, and IO resources. Storage and backup services measure their costs using GBs consumed.

The point is, each service is priced according to the resources you use on an hourly basis. One size does not fit all, unfortunately, so to price your solution, you should understand the full scope of the services consumed as well as how the cost of each service is calculated by Microsoft.

Azure pricing tiers – the more resources used, the more you pay

Over and above the different measures used to determine the cost of each service, each also has different pricing tiers and the price increases as you choose to consume more resources.

For example, virtual machines come in a variety of different preconfigured instances each with its own vCPU, memory, and storage configuration. The more resources the instance you choose consumes, the more you pay. Databases, on the other hand, give you the option to set the number of instances, the type (managed, elastic pool or single database), and the generation. Storage is calculated by the type of storage (blob, file, table, etc.), the level of redundancy you require, and of course, the size.

In essence, this illustrates how each service has its own unique permutation of resources used to calculate the cost per hour and the higher the number of resources used, the higher the cost. If we have multiple services to price, you can start to see how calculating the cost of a solution becomes overwhelming.

Don’t forget pricing for ancillary services

When pricing Azure services, remember to determine the ancillary services your solution uses. This is crucial to figure the overall cost as many solution calculations have failed to take these costs into account at their own peril.

For example, virtual networks carry a bandwidth transfer cost and backups are an additional charge. It is essential that every resource you use for your solution be accounted for up front to ensure there are no nasty price surprises down the line.

Azure pricing is complex – use the Azure Pricing Calculator

As we have seen, Azure offers a multitude of different cloud service solutions, each priced in its own way. Also, when we build our costing model, it is essential to itemize each service and understand how the cost is calculated, then choose the right pricing tier while also remembering to add in any ancillary services.

Building an Azure costing model can become overwhelming, but thankfully there are resources and tools available to assist us in getting the information we need. There are multiple pricing resources on the Azure portal which detail how each service is priced, however, the Azure Pricing Calculator is an invaluable resource to understand Azure costs. With this tool, you can itemize each service, choose the appropriate pricing tier, and also add any ancillary services you may need to consume.

Azure cost saving tips

Now that we have discussed how complex and intricate Azure pricing can be let’s take a look at a few ways you can save costs while ensuring your solution is not negatively impacted.

Switch off what you don’t use: Microsoft Azure works on a pay-per-use subscription model so the more you use, the more you pay. To reduce costs, you can deallocate certain types of resources when they are not in use to save money. Shutting down virtual machines which are not in active use is a perfect example. A shutdown virtual machine only incurs storage costs saving you money on the computing resources not in use when the virtual machine is not running.

Azure prepaid subscriptions and alternate regions: Pre-paying for Azure services also has saving benefits as Microsoft has built discounts into the different pre-payment models. In addition, if you have the flexibility to deploy to another Azure region, some services in certain regions cost less than the same service in a more popular or remote region where resources have high demand.

Choose the right pricing tier for your solution: The best way to save money when deploying your solution to Azure is to make sure you pick the right level of resource for the performance you expect. This is the key factor which ultimately impacts cost per hour.

Cloud vs. on-premise – TCO is a key measure

Hosting your solution on a cloud platform like Azure does come with costs, the intricacies of which have been discussed in this post. You may think that hosting your solution on-premise may be a better option with all the permutations to consider. This is not true. The Cloud is often the right financial choice, and the key here is to understand the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of your solution whether you to host it on Azure or on-premise.

To understand Azure’s TCO, it is important to realize that Azure pricing includes the procurement, management, and ongoing maintenance of the underlying hardware, software, and networking infrastructure which hosts these services. On Azure, you do not only pay for the cloud service you consume, but you also pay for the management, maintenance, and security of that service. If you compare hosting a solution on-premise versus hosting it on Azure, it is imperative that you take these management and infrastructure costs into account.

If you host your solution on-premise and accurately compare this cost to Azure, you have to calculate the direct costs associated with managing and maintaining your own hardware and software. You also need to add the inefficiency cost of not utilizing the full resources at your disposal as well as the opportunity cost of investing a large amount of capital which could be put to better use elsewhere in your organization. And it is these indirect costs which swing the balance in Azure’s favor.

If you take the full TCO of an on-premise solution and compare it to the Azure cost for hosting the same service, Azure is usually more cost-effective. It is especially true if we consider the hidden indirect costs which come with hosting solutions on-premise. Why would you want to take on this responsibility if it is not core to your business? Let Azure take care of your IT services while you take care of growing your business.

The post Microsoft Azure Pricing 101: Tips and Tricks appeared first on SherWeb.

Some managed service providers are reluctant to offer unified communications because they think it’s a lot of time-consuming deployments for an on-premises VoIP system. Well, we have good news: hosted VoIP is here. With the unified communications as a service (UCaaS) model, it only takes a good internet connection for your clients to start enjoying a stable, cost-effective business phone solution. Making a profit offering unified communications is easy.

When customers are looking for a unified communications solution, they want to manage computer-related communications and phone capabilities altogether.

Let’s take a few examples.

1) An organisation wants to make sure missed calls are always followed up

The business owner needs a business phone system with voicemail. Also, each employee must be notified by email when someone leaves a message on their voicemail extension. Unified communications provide that integration between phone and email.

2) A company wants to better manage communications costs for mobile employees

The business owner needs every call made from the company phone system. But, some employees are always on the move. A unified communications solution will help roaming staff call from the company phone system using an internet-connected smartphone or laptop. These features are called WebRTC (or Virtual Phone) and Softphone.

3) A business wants to keep using fax, but wants to cut expenses on fax machine and paper

With unified communications, fax service is integrated to email. This feature is called virtual fax. So, sending and receiving fax can simply be done through the user’s mailbox. There is no fax machine needed and a fax message is only printed when required, from the email.

A good VoIP solution will provide all unified communications features to respond to every business need. 

Unified communications as a service is the new trend

Cloud solutions offer a business flexibility because they can stream expenses for better control. If your customers have already adopted subscription-based services like email, productivity applications and online CRM platforms, there’s nothing to stop them from considering Unified Communications as a Service for their business phone needs.

Customers want to be free from heavy hardware costs and they’re willing to go to the cloud. So, why keep offering a solution that can only be deployed on-premises? If you’re willing to stay competitive and keep your business sustainable, you have to give your customers what they’re looking for. Failing to do so could spell the end of your business.

Today’s buyer is more aware than you think

Maybe you’ve been offering on-premises VoIP and you’re comfortable doing it. Are you planning to attract more clients? Or, do you have a plan to renew your current clients’ contracts? Even though things look good now, you can’t be sure they’ll stay that way.

Today’s buyer is a lot more savvy. Before they decide to make a purchase, most business owners will do a lot of research to compare your Unified Communications offering with others on the market. By the time they’re ready to buy, they’re well aware of their business phone options.

Be smart when adding unified communications as a service to your offering

You have to offer hosted VoIP because that’s what your customers want. But you also have to understand their expectations so you can choose the right UCaaS provider. Don’t choose a provider based on price alone.

Here’s what your business phone customers are expecting from a unified communications as a service provider (in no particular order of importance):

• Good voice quality
• Network integration
• Good pricing
• Mobility
• Flexible billing
• Interesting features
• Security

The post The Truth About Unified Communications and Why MSPs Can’t Ignore It appeared first on SherWeb.

When you’re looking for a cloud backup solution for your business, you’re not just thinking about storing a few files in a remote location. You’re planning your disaster recovery strategy. You want a reliable tool that will store your business data and help you recover it when you need it. The thing is, your data is spread over different types of computers, devices and applications, which makes your strategy more complicated. There are a few things you should keep in mind.

You want a cloud backup solution that can protect local machines

The term ‘local machine’ goes beyond the simple desktop. You’re using computers for all your daily tasks and they’re essential for your business. For example, they host your:

• Services to manage your network at the office (like DHCP, Wi-Fi, router)
• Local domain services (like Active Directory, DNS)
• Print services (sharing multifunctional printers in the company)
• Physical access control system (surveillance cameras, cards or biometrics to enter company buildings)
• System management for food and beverage machines

And the list goes on. Every single downtime on these services can damage your company’s productivity. A cloud backup solution for business that helps you do a full backup of the operating system and your computer applications will ensure that you can always get back on your feet.

You want a cloud backup solution that can protect your servers

Your servers can be hardware servers or virtual machines (VMware, Hyper-V, etc.). They can run any Linux distribution or Windows, as the operating system. The most important thing is the service they are hosting:

• Public web site
• eCommerce application
• Accounting platform
• Email system
• Customer relationship management

Your servers could be on-premises or in the cloud, it doesn’t matter. When you’re looking for a cloud backup solution for business, you want to recover quickly if something goes wrong, like a user error or a ransomware attack.

You want a cloud backup solution that can protect your databases and applications

A modern IT application will be made up of different functionalities. It’s often a 3-tier design with a:

• Presentation interface (the client software or web page with interactive windows)
• Business logic (a server that receives and processes requests, and pulls the right data)
• Database and programming (the data and its management system)

For example, with your Outlook client software, you write emails that the SMTP email server will send, and those emails will be stored in a mailbox database so you can read them later or forward them to someone else.

Your cloud backup solution for business should be able to handle this complexity as well as its constraints. For example, it should know how to handle files that are ‘open,’ meaning being read or written by the system. It should allow you to back up all the tiers and restore them in the right sequence, so they can run together again after an incident.

You want a cloud backup solution that can protect all the diversity of end-user devices

Gone are the days when employees were only using desktops or laptops at the office.

• Today’s users are also accessing and processing business data from smartphones and tablets
• They’re working from public or home networks
• They’re using their personal devices for work
• Business data is cohabiting with personal files

Every IT administrator wants to make sure the data on these devices is protected. Your cloud backup solution for business needs to back up as much data as possible from mobile devices.

You want a cloud backup solution that offers centralised management and cloud-to-cloud capabilities

IT administrators are sometimes forced to switch from one product to another to do their backup tasks. This is because some vendors will only offer backup for specific scenarios. However, a few vendors will cover them all, so you can orchestrate your backup strategy from a single console.

A cloud backup that offers a centralized management tool will help businesses:

• Organize the backups based on the type of device or application
• Prepare different schedules to run the backup tasks
• Delegate backup management activities to other people
• Manage backups for different domains
• Restore data remotely on a device or computer

Being able to back up local machines, virtual machines, cloud servers, applications, databases and mobile devices from a single interface is the IT person’s dream.

You don’t want a file sync and share solution

Many vendors will present their file sync and share solution as a cloud backup solution for business. We both know that it’s not.

A file sync and share solution will only help you:

• Share files between different users
• Have multiple users edit the same version of a file in real time
• Get the latest edited version of a file synced on multiple devices

A file sync and share solution works well for documents, spreadsheets, slide decks and multimedia. It won’t work for backing up servers, workstations, databases and emails.

In other words, you can’t just use DropBox, Google Drive, OneDrive or similar platforms as a cloud backup solution for your business.

Conclusion

We’ve told you what to keep in mind when you’re shopping for your cloud backup solution for business. Remember, the success of your disaster recovery strategy depends on the solution you choose.

Want to know more about our cloud backup solution for business? Click here.

The post 6 Things to Keep in Mind When Shopping for a Cloud Backup Solution for Business appeared first on SherWeb.

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Beware of the fast-talking salesperson with the “simple” solutions. If you’re being told that the solution to your business problems is as easy as 1-2-3, there’s a good chance it’s not. That common principle applies to most tech products, and a Customer Relationship Management tool (CRM) is no exception.

While the cloud has standardised software use by removing what is often the most complicated part of the process — the installation on the server – this doesn’t mean that everything is just ready to go. Definitely not for a CRM.

How much do you know about using a CRM? A lot of people are discouraged because they think a CRM is too difficult to use and deploy. We thought we’d set the record straight. Here are 3 common pitfalls of CRM deployment and how you can avoid them.

Failing to plan your deployment

CRM applications are even more affordable these days, thanks in large part to the SaaS model and the price drop in cloud infrastructure. But that doesn’t mean you should just run out and buy one without having a good plan in place.

Before you start to analyse which CRM you want, you should ask yourself some basic questions:

• What do we want to improve in our customer’s journey?
• Who will be using the tool and what are they going to be using it for?
• Is this strictly for sales or will we extend it to marketing, customer service and/or stock management capabilities?

By developing a clear vision about why you need a CRM, how it will help your sales processes and who will be the active users of the platform, you’ll have all the information in hand to start analyzing the different CRM solutions on the market. Don’t be surprised — or overwhelmed — there are a lots of applications out there. You just have to choose the one that best suits your needs.

Not customising your CRM for your business

As we already mentioned, beware of the easy route. Do you think your business is unique? Does it have its own value proposition, its own mission statement?

If you answered no to these questions, you have a problem. And believe us, you won’t solve it by using a CRM. But just as your business has its own mission and values, it also has its own way of doing things. You know why your company is unique and how your business is different from your next door neighbor’s or even your biggest competitor.

Before your users can even begin to use your CRM instance, you should customize the data entry fields for your accounts, contacts, leads and opportunities to reflect the information you really want to capture.

You should also take a look at your various processes: from taking a lead to an opportunity and then to a paying customer. How do those processes play out? How can you make your CRM adapt to your organization’s sales cycle?

There are several ways to approach this.

First off is the do it yourself method. Going this route implies you’re a technically-savvy individual with some prior knowledge of the CRM tool you’re using and that you can develop around it. If this isn’t the case, you might find yourself investing a lot of time in a project that produces disappointing results.

Another option is to bring in a CRM integrator. These are experts who will be able to bend the actual CRM platform to fit your exact needs. You’ll get the results you envisioned, and your fully customised CRM will fit your business needs. On the downside, the deployment costs could escalate quickly. CRM Integrators usually charge by the hour and it’s often difficult to accurately predict the time needed to customize your CRM.

And finally, there’s what we’ll call semi-automated deployment. What does this mean? In this case, a tool is used to configure your CRM to fit your needs. It requires very little human involvement and the result is a CRM instance that answers all your organisation’s needs.

Here’s a concrete example. At SherWeb, we sell Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online. To help our customers get started as soon as possible, we offer the RapidStart CRM deployment package as an add-on. This means that, for a fixed cost, our customers can get a customized environment in a short time. We work with them to make sure everything is deployed to fit their needs and that customer data is imported to the CRM instance. This ensures their team is ready to get to work on day one.

Not training staff to use the platform

Another common pitfall: users rarely get the necessary training. Here, it’s not only about power users. Trainings should be done accordingly to the user’s specific role and how he will use the CRM tool.

There’s no need to show a user features that he won’t have the rights or permission to use. It’ll just create more confusion. On the other hand, if you don’t do a deep-dive training with power users, they’ll be left guessing how CRM works and more importantly, what your company’s CRM processes are.

And this is an important point. As much as technical/practical training is needed to succeed in CRM, the pitfalls we’ve covered in this article cannot be resolved if your organization doesn’t provide your staff information about how you want to handle processes such as creating a lead, closing an opportunity, etc.

These are business processes, and they’re unique to every organisation. Make sure you communicate them clearly. This will improve the adoption rate of your CRM with your staff and ensure a successful CRM deployment.

We understand that deploying a CRM is a big business decision. But it’s one that will help your organization reap amazing benefits… provided it’s done properly.

The post 3 Common Pitfalls of a CRM Deployment appeared first on SherWeb.

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You’ve put a lot of effort into building your cloud business and you want to make sure you stay ahead of the competition. You’ve kept a close eye on market trends and you’ve seen there are many ways to measure business performance. But, how much do you really know about Key Performance Indicators and how they affect your business? Did you know that the right KPIs can make the difference between continued success and a slow decline?

You’re probably wondering what kind of KPIs you should be looking at and how often you have to do it. Don’t worry. We’ve done all the grunt work for you. Here are seven Key Performance Indicators that will help you measure your success in the cloud.

Measure your customer growth

Look closely at the monthly figures provided by your sales team. Are they still bringing in new customers? Are your numbers this quarter higher or equal to what you saw last month? This is not the time for your sales team to be running out of steam. If you notice that customer growth is declining, start asking questions. Maybe your sales people aren’t getting enough lead volumes from the Marketing department. You have to look at the value provided by each sales person. In the cloud industry, 8-10 percent is ideal and 15 percent is acceptable. However, a higher percentage means the person’s quota is either too low or their income is too high. Deciding what to pay sales people has been a major challenge for partners who want to attract good sales reps to the cloud.

Calculate your average revenue per user (ARPU)

This is a very important metric. As competition in the cloud industry grows, resellers are spending more time cultivating long-term relationships to maximize their Average Revenue per User (ARPU). Get involved in cross-selling. Build a joint roadmap with your customer so you can stay involved with his business. It’ll be up to you to continually educate him about how you can help him meet the numerous challenges he’ll be facing.

You might also consider hiring a dedicated marketing/sales expert. But don’t make this move until you’re sure the expert can generate enough revenue from renewals and cross-selling and upselling. For example, a sales expert who costs you $50,000 in salary, commission and benefits should be able to drive a minimum of $333,000 in revenue.

What are you spending on marketing?

If you’re struggling with your sales volume, it’s time to look at your marketing program. A lot of partners we spoke to said they were spending less than 1 or 2 percent of their revenue on driving net new demand. Successful channel partners tend to spend as much as 8-10 percent on marketing. Since cash flows are spread out over longer periods, it’s really important to ramp up acquisition and make sure you’re investing as much money as possible to maximize your marketing.

Take a hard look at your renewal rate

What’s an ideal number? You should be looking for less than 8-10 percent per year of annual churn. However, this number will vary based on your customer acquisition rate. Customers are making purchase decisions every month and it’s important to keep the lines of communication open.

The renewal process is ongoing. From the day your customer signs their first contract, you’re ensuring they understand how important it is to get the product you’re selling and do business with you. You should make sure you give them plenty of reasons to renew.

Consider value-added services

A lot of partners make the same mistake. They offer the same services year after year and try to squeeze every penny out of the deal. You have to realize that SMBs are adopting cloud technology at a faster rate every year. If you don’t offer the cutting-edge services your clients need to stay competitive, they’ll simply go somewhere else. Partners who’ve developed their business model around Project or Managed Services can earn between 50-65 percent of their revenue from these services. This is one of the areas where you have the most control, so keep looking for opportunities to add to your offer. Ideally, a new partner should aim to have 15 percent of revenue from these sources by the end of year one, 33 percent by year two, and 45 percent or more by year three.

Look at your gross margins by offering

No matter what kind of services you offer, it’s important to see what kind of profit you’re getting from each one. For example, you should really strive for a gross margin of 30 percent or more for each Project Services offering. On the other hand, Managed Services offerings should return at least 40 percent while IP offerings should give you more than 50 percent margins. If your returns are lower, this may indicate that you haven’t established your offering properly or that something else is out of kilter. Take a close look at your services and why you’ve added them to your offering in the first place. If you’ve started offering a solution or service simply because one customer asked for it, step back and see how successful it’s been for your business. If it’s not creating reasonable income for your company, it might be time to replace it with something else.

How efficient are these value-added services?

Aside from the KPIs we’ve mentioned here, there are others that relate specifically to your project services and managed services. Gross Service Margins, the Efficiency Factor, Usage and Billable Markup Rates are the most significant KPIs for value-added services. Each of these KPIs will let you know how each service is performing and provide early warnings when you need to make adjustments. You should include them in your BI dashboards and add them to your quarterly assessments. Pay close attention to the Efficiency Factor. This measures how much of your work can be repurposed, packaged and resold as IP. Remember, your customers are looking for turnkey products they can implement right away, so use these building blocks to either jumpstart projects, or resell them as a finished product. This will make a difference in the kind of profits you can generate overall.

The post 7 Top KPIs to Measure Your Success in the Cloud appeared first on SherWeb.

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By Mathieu LeBlanc

If you’ve been selling cloud services for a while, you’ve probably noticed that it’s getting harder to make a decent living as an independent. Yes, the demand for cloud services is high, but there’s a lot of other cloud resellers like you who are getting into the game. Recent statistics from MSP Alliance show that managed service providers (MSPs) generated revenue of about $154 billion (£106.8bn) selling cloud services in 2014.

Faced with these numbers, you’re probably wondering what you can possibly do to stand out from the crowd. What can you offer that will make clients more interested in talking to you instead of the other guy? The answer lies in a good partner program. When you join forces with a trusted cloud service provider, you can be sure you’re giving your clients the best services without sacrificing too much of your own time.

But how can you decide which program is best for your needs? After all, there are plenty of vendors out there who are offering a multitude of programs with more features than you can possibly imagine. We know it’s a tough call. That’s why we’ve put together this simple guide that will show you exactly what to look for and what to avoid when you start shopping for the ideal partner program.

Do you recognise their hardware?

What does their platform look like? Is it put together with top-of-the-line equipment, or does it look more like some spare parts thrown together with chicken wire? Your clients deserve high speed and performance and you won’t get that without good hardware.

You should be able to recognise some of the brands your potential cloud partner is using. Believe it or not, there are many stories about cloud providers who are using seriously out-of-date equipment just to cut costs. For example, do they use enterprise-grade All Flash SSD storage in all his solutions, or just in the more expensive models? If a cloud provider is cutting corners on hardware, it could indicate they’re not that interested in providing good or reliable service.

Can you rely on their technical support?

Let’s face it: good technical support plays a big role in cloud hosting. If you or your client needs help, you want to be sure you can get it, whether it’s during regular office hours or at 3am. You might be tempted to go with a big company’s partner program because there’s safety in numbers.

But remember, dealing with a big company doesn’t mean you’ll have an easy ride. For instance, have you ever tried calling Microsoft’s partner support department? Although Microsoft offers a great online knowledge base and help site, talking to a real person when you need help can be difficult. Look for a partner program that offers free support 24/7/365 by phone, email or chat.

What kind of product training can you expect?

Signing the contract with your new partner is only the first step. You have to be sure you can be properly trained to sell their products. Some cloud providers limit their training and workshops to the bigger resellers who have larger sales volumes. You want to look for a partner program where everyone is treated equally. You want to make sure everyone who signs up for the program is eligible for training from specialists who will teach you the ropes about their products and services. Some programs even offer different models to give you as much or as little control over the customer relationships and offers. So, don’t be afraid to ask questions.

The post Three Essential Tips for Choosing a Cloud Partner Program appeared first on SherWeb.

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By Simon Langlois

Everyone can agree, storage quotas for cloud services are increasing very quickly. And this means only one thing: cloud storage is getting dirt-cheap. This is nothing new, as organisations have been getting more and more gigabyte (GB) for their buck in the past months. Some of the industry’s biggest cloud players, like Amazon, Google and Microsoft have been engaging in a war on storage. Who will include the biggest quota at the lowest price? And who will cut down prices to low prices we’ve never seen before?

This trend is here to stay. If we back up in time a little bit, storage used to be an important part of bundling offers. The more GB you wanted, the more vendors charged you. That is still true, on some levels. Now, storage has little value. You want 1 TB of cloud storage per user? No problem! Combine it with some awesome apps that will allow you to do business more easily. You’ll save a lot of money. Vendors are focusing on delivering value through unique suites and bundles of services.

But all this data storage at never seen before low prices, is it really a privilege? It’s more some sort of burden if you ask me. I’d even like to challenge the unlimited GB give-away big players are now marketing. Why?

Loosened IT controls

A good side of this war on price is that IT departments in organisations can now evolve into cloud brokers for internal needs. They don’t need to worry about capacity management anymore (well at least a lot less). They don’t have to enforce restrictive application use governance to maintain an acceptable level of growth and minimise storage costs. They can focus on bringing value to different business units by effectively finding, delivering, and integrating the right cloud services to them. But this, unfortunately, leads to a different problem.

Irrelevant and unstructured storage

Human beings will be human beings. Give them 1 TB with no guidelines and they’ll use it to store random content. They’ll fill up that storage and come back for more before you know it. I might be exaggerating here, but hear my point. If there are no guidelines and storage is cheap, people will end up storing personal data such as music, pictures, videos – you name it. And even if they only store work-related documentation they’ll bulk up unvalued documents and files that are either on hold, copies, drafts, or outdated. After just a couple of years of service usage and employment it can easily add-up to 200 GB per user.

If you’re lucky enough, this content will all be structured. But life isn’t that simple, is it? Interesting enough, Gartner claims that 80% of data held by organisations is unstructured. Not only do people handle a lot of documentation, they waste time looking for it! So what does irrelevant and unstructured storage lead to?

A high level of complexity when it comes to moving/retaining unnecessary data

Having a lot of storage is great, at first. But then the moment comes when you have to either clean, retain or move data. Now you’re in for complexity. And in IT, complex equals hefty costs. To prove my point, I’ll provide an example of this in the current context.

Faced by the recent price drop in the oil industry, Company XYZ had to let go 1,000 employees. Let’s say these employees had been using OneDrive for a couple of years. When combined, their accounts add up to a surprising 200TB of unstructured data. This leaves the company three options.

• Let the data be for a couple of years. By the way, common legal compliance is to hold business data for seven years. Since storage is cheap, this might not seem like an issue. But why did Company XYZ let go 1,000 employees again? To reduce expenses. Maintaining the data of 1,000 inactive users for seven years, even if it’s at a low monthly fee per user, results in a salty bill for the company.
• Migrate the data to a cheaper cloud storage solution, or maybe to an unused on-premises server. This will lower the monthly costs of maintaining the users’ data. But unfortunately, big cloud vendors like Microsoft and Google don’t provide a free tool to easily complete migration. This means investing in a migration tool. Since data migration is complex, such tools from third parties come at high prices. Plus, the hundreds of hours spent by employees (or hired professional services) will add to the expenses. Might not be cheaper than option 1 after all.
• Delete everything. The ultimate option. Although it is the most cost effective solution, it is not recommended. Nor is it allowed by legal departments most times.

So what happens when you’re stuck with all this unnecessary data?

Well-planned, implemented and maintained data governance has great value

The moral of the story here? As appealing as letting go or smoothing governance of directions, control and measure over data stored in the cloud can be for IT departments, it’s a no go. It leads to high expenses, unnecessary/irrelevant/disorganised content, affected productivity as employees search for documents, and so on. And this especially comes true when cloud storage is unlimited.  Which bring us back to: is access to unlimited cloud storage for data really a privilege?

Unlimited storage is a poisoned gift

It may take a while before organisations realise this, but unlimited storage is not as great a gift as it seems. The minute any organisation will have to migrate their content somewhere else – be it an acquisition or letting go employees for instance – large amounts of data will become a burden. It’s better to monitor a smaller quota that can be increased if the need comes. What do you think?

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Disaster recovery – the IT industry’s latest buzz words. Although a popular subject, many of the articles out there are not providing accurate or enough information to demystify the concept. How does one explain disaster recovery to a SMB owner or an organisation’s president without confusing them more than clarifying? Or without boring the hell out of them? Here’s my attempt.

First, there are a few terms you’ll need to acquaint yourself with. Like RTO and RPO. Common slang for us IT experts, but nonsense to non IT professionals.

RTO: Recovery time objective. Simply put: how much time between the moment of the disaster and the time users can work again?

RPO: Recovery point objective. How far back in time are you willing to go in case of a disaster? How much work and/or transactions can be lost without hindering business continuity?

Both of these are counted in minutes, hours or days, and are directly related to the criticality of your IT processes and data. The lower the number is for RTO and RPO, the higher the cost will be for a disaster recovery solution.

Usually, it’s mostly core business applications and data that are included in the scope of a disaster recovery plan. If you think about it, what data is your business dealing with that is not business critical? Usually most of it is, but because disaster recovery can get pricey, some organizations choose to only include a certain percentage of their data in the plan. This, of course, means that you won’t access the data you didn’t include in the plan should a disaster occur.

Before I paint you a broader picture, here are other important terms you should know. Here are the 3 types of recovery sites. An important thought to keep in mind: there is not wrong or right here. The key is to find a disaster recovery plan that meets your organization’s specific needs.

Cold site: A cold site is a datacenter with sleeping servers (virtual or physical) where regular offsite backups can be restored to the sleeping servers. For example, backups for mission critical systems could be done every six hours. This is the most affordable and common type of disaster recovery for SMBs. Usually this scheme is chosen for longer RTO/RPO values.

Warm site: Warm sites require better infrastructure, but they can bring down RTO and RPO to minutes. It all depends on internet link speed, latency, etc. Because they require active licenses, warm sites have about the same total cost of ownership as the original datacenter they are duplicating. Sometimes, they can even cost a little more because of the costs for synchronizing tools for servers and data.

Geographically dispersed high availability: This type of site offers almost instant backups of the duplicated environment in real-time. It is achieved through applicative and network load balancing, and requires advanced Domain Name System (DNS) servers management process.

Cold and warm sites have been the most common disaster recovery options for larger corporations as their data processing defines their business continuity capabilities. Nowadays, the widespread adoption of cloud services allows eased implementation and cost reduction like never before.

Most companies now use virtual servers to handle their daily computing requirements. Virtual server infrastructures are inherently more resilient and easier to replicate across internet and WAN links. Cloud hosting providers can help companies setup a warm site with reduced capabilities through a synchronization procedure that respects the target RPO/TRO. 

One the main features of a cloud infrastructure is elasticity. This means that in the advent of a disaster, one simply allocates the required resources to the synchronized servers and move the operations to the cloud hosted infrastructure. This type of set up wasn’t possible before the advent of public clouds from reputable cloud hosting providers like Amazon or SherWeb.

Of course, these setups still require planning and the expertise of IT architects/business specialists to address the specificities of each company. These experts can assess with accuracy the companies’ mission critical needs and thus evaluate feasibility to properly set the requirements of a disaster recovery plan. Cloud technology has made disaster recovery solutions within reach of most SMBs that rely on IT to thrive.

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By Bernardo Reyes

We’ve reached it, the critical stage between cloud growth and cloud maturity. And there’s no need to deny that with cloud maturity come great opportunities. Just like Uncle Ben said, right? But more seriously, as a Managed Service Provider (MSP), how can you be sure that adding the cloud to your organisation now is right? Did you at all consider the cloud as a more profitable model for your business in 2015?

Understanding recurring revenues

Try to think of an industry that generates billions of dollars and that is based on recurring revenues. Hint: most of us depend – and are highly addicted – to its services. We are so hooked that we’re willing to blindly pay high fees each and every month. And that’s just to access the service. Wondering what industry I’m talking about? Mobile network companies. Yes, cellphone companies are very profitable companies. May I kindly remind you of the billing model they’re using to bill us? The recurring revenues billing model.

Most MSPs are used to the traditional services model, which can be very lucrative when sales are booming, yet it can also be unforgiving if sales are not performing so well.

The beauty of the recurring revenue model resides in its long term profitability. The challenge for MSPs? Manage the rate of churn and keep down to a minimum the number of lost customers. An achievement that should not be too hard to accomplish if you’re offering great customer support.

The model’s fairly simple, each customer generates XYZ amount of profit per month. The more customers are on board, the higher profits are. These 3 charts from the IDC eBook “Successful Cloud Partners 2.0: What IT Solution Providers Need to Know to Build Profitable Cloud Practices” offer a good visual comparison between the traditional services model and the Cloud/Managed services model. You can notice that the recurring revenue model offers more predictability in terms of incoming revenues. Just imagine if you can’t close enough sales during a specific period and don’t reach the predicted profits. Well at least with recurring revenues, you have a safety net and money is still piling up in your bank account.

The eternal quest of a common denominator with customers

Adding the cloud to your offering does not mean you should stop selling on-premises solutions altogether. On the contrary! Offering both gives your end-customers the power of choice. Some are still scared by the cloud, therefore they might choose to stick with an on-prem solution. Others may choose to move half of their solutions to the cloud while keeping the rest in-house.

At the end of the day, you want to know the advantages selling the cloud has for you. Especially in a competitive market like the IT industry where you must stay ahead of the game.

We’re all customers. And as customers, we usually opt for products that are intuitive (just think about the popularity of tablets) and affordable. Basically we want as much as we can for our buck, and we won’t compromise quality. And we want it to be as simple as possible.

The quadrant below explains quite well customer behaviour. Most of us fall in the top left category. And very few of us want to fall in the bottom right category. Why? Because cheap and easy is the way to go. If you run a business, your ultimate goal is to make profits. And to make profits, you want to cut expenses.

How does the cloud fit in there? Well it’s affordable, especially for SMBs or growing companies, and it’s simple. How? Let’s say your clients already have in-house servers, which have been running for a few years. They probably have IT tech(s) in their team or are very dependable on their service provider. In either situation, this results in high costs and complicated in-house deployments. Plus, the servers need frequent maintenance and will most likely be obsolete in a couple years.

The cloud, on the other hand, grants the access to up-to-date software and services. Migration is seamless and easy: it’s taken care for by professionals. Plus, there is no need to worry about maintaining the hardware, it’s all taken care of. No more insomnia worrying about downtime, cooling of hardware, power outages, etc. Furthermore with the cloud resources are unlimited. You can sell as much as the customer asks for without having to worry about employee turnover and attrition.

Success in the cloud

The key is choosing the right provider. That’s it. There are many well-established companies selling the cloud right now. What’s the most important feature to take into account when you choose your provider? Reliability. When choosing a reliable provider, you offer peace of mind to yourself and your customers.

The post What can MSPs gain from linear growth and recurring revenue appeared first on SherWeb.

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There’s no denying it: the cloud industry has reached maturity. And businesses are lining up to make a move to the cloud. According to Gartner, organizations will store 36% of their content in the cloud by 2016, a big jump from the meagre 7% they stored in 2011.

Managed service providers (MSPs) who want to tap into this growing market will have to decide how to approach the cloud. They’ll have to assess their customers’ needs, what kind of offering they can deliver and what kind of strategy will ensure their success. What kind of MSP are you? Here are three common profiles.

The Risk-Taker

This type of MSP likes to be in control. To make sure he has complete ownership of the infrastructure, he won’t go with any public cloud provider. He’ll build his own cloud. The biggest benefit? 100% control. Guaranteed. From the infrastructure’s components to updates and maintenance, everything will be in the hands of the service provider.

But at what cost?

If you’re thinking about deploying your own cloud, consider these facts:

• The initial investment is high.
• It’ll take about three years before you see a Return on Investment (ROI).
• Competition in the market is fierce and your cloud cost won’t be able to match what the big providers are offering.

You should also account for time spent on maintenance and updates. MSPs who take this route should also know that it can’t be sustained forever.

The Conventional

Next is the conventional MSP. Unlike the risk-taker, this guy will trust another provider for his cloud needs. And that provider will be a big brand that everyone knows: Amazon, Google, Microsoft…

This route has some benefits. The MSP will be able to build his own bundle to resell. He’ll also find it easier to convince customers to move to the cloud. After all, who doesn’t know Amazon or Microsoft? The risk? Almost non-existent.

What’s the catch? Well, competition in this market is brutal. There are a lot of other players out there reselling the same cloud. Your customers can get cloud offerings from almost anyone, and probably at a lower cost!

Can you make a lot of money? If you want to sell, you’ll have to go cheap. Or, you’ll have to develop a value proposition that will be unique in your market.

The Trailblazer

Last but not least, we have the trailblazer. This type of MSP will be looking for a white-label provider to get the best of both worlds.

Relying on a white-label provider will help the MSP build his credibility. He can offer an enterprise-grade infrastructure without investing a lot of money to deploy his own cloud. And he can benefit from the latest hardware updates and maintenance and still be in control of server usage. Scalability will never be an issue. Adding or removing servers can be done quickly, ensuring that you pay only for what you use.

The best part of this model? You can sell it as your cloud to your customers. It gives you all the flexibility you need to tailor your offer and sell services that cater to your customers’ specific needs. The end result? A boost in your credibility.

The only thing you’re not getting from this model is a hands-on approach to the hardware. But since you can choose and configure your servers, this shouldn’t be a deal breaker for someone who wants to increase profits in the IaaS market.

What’s your strategy for 2015?

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