Cloud Computing Services have the ability to transform the way IT services are delivered to your business, enabling you to save on hardware and maintenance costs while enhancing system capabilities and reducing down-time. However, moving your New Jersey business to the “cloud” is not a decision that should be taken lightly or done because it’s “the new way” to run a business. Before you blindly jump on the cloud computing bandwagon, here are three hurdles you need to consider and anticipate:

Cost

Cloud computing looks like a great deal because it is relatively affordable to install. But when you take a step back at look at the big picture, cloud computing and storage might become more expensive in the long term than most New Jersey businesses owners realize. For instance, let’s say it costs $100 to buy a 2 terabyte hard drive. That averages out about to $.09 a gigabyte to store your information, which is pretty inexpensive. Meanwhile, Amazon’s S3 service is charging about $.14 a gigabyte each month, Carbonite is charging small businesses $250 a year for up to 250 gigabytes ($599 for 500 gigabytes) and Rackspace charges $.15 per gigabyte each month for storage. Over a 3-4 year period, that $100 hard drive is much cheaper storage option.

Security

No network firewall is 100% infallible, although a good IT services provider should be able to be as close to perfect as they can get at all times, and cloud computing is no exception. Critics of cloud computing say its networks are ripe targets for hackers, who are always on the lookout for new ways to access “secure data.” The numerous cloud computing issues facing Sony in 2011 (77,000 PlayStation Network users’ data was compromised) made headlines throughout the year, prompting many business owners to wonder just how safe their cloud was from a dedicated attack. Meanwhile, supporters argue that since office-based computers are connected to the Internet, businesses are not any more vulnerable when using the cloud. Some also say that by using a cloud technology service, businesses are passing their data to companies that are experts in protecting it.

Internet Uptime

Having a cloud computing system in place won’t do your business much good if your Internet is too slow to handle the needs of your employees or if the connection is tenuous at best. If your business depends heavily on the Internet, your employees can only be as productive as your system’s uptime allows them to be. A 2011 Dell seminar hypothesized that without a fast connection, a business could lose out on productivity costing on average $75 per employee per hour! It’s essential to ensure your Internet uptime is void of interruptions.

There are a lot of cloud computing benefits that a New Jersey business could take advantage of, but it’s important to educate yourself about the pros AND cons of cloud computing before deciding to pull the trigger.