Transferring and storing data has never been easier with the assistance of cloud services, something that allows companies to streamline their work and increase efficiency toward customer service.
Businesses are able to use each cloud service provider to improve their end game and customer service, explained Michael Zafiris, a software specialist and Google Apps Certified Deployment Specialist at InterlockIT.
Where larger cloud providers target business, Dropbox and others such as SugarSync and ADrive have targeted the general consumer market.As one of Canada’s two Google Apps Premier SMB Resellers, InterlockIT’s primary business operations revolve around migrating companies away from “traditional” email systems (like Exchange or Lotus Notes) to Google Apps, which is a suite of applications that enable business to work much more efficiently and more cheaply than their old systems.
Along with using Google, Zafiris pointed out InterlockIT also uses Microsoft Office 365 and cloud services that enable the company to automate a lot of the work.
There are a ton of benefits that come from using nearly any cloud computing product, said Zafiris.
“Obviously there are cost savings as there’s no hardware to keep updated and no need to ever buy new servers since the provider takes care of all of that for you,” he explained. “This results in reduced overhead so your IT staff can focus on things to make you more efficient. We’ve helped many customers become server free. Cloud computing is a disruptive way of work that provides cheaper, more convenient, and simpler business solutions that work.”
The most valued aspect of using a cloud provider is that it isn’t specific to any job, trade, or industry. A company is also able to access it anywhere around the world as long as there is an Internet connection.
For Ontario-based Enliten Energy Services Corporation, the use of cloud allows company technicians a convenient and efficient service to tether and upload directly. Not only does it instantly sync the information across everyone’s accounts, it provides instantaneous information and knowledge of the situation and how it can be fixed. This in turn enables the company to efficiently address a client’s needs.
“In this way, our central base and our coordinator has instant access to our real-time data and can immediately spot problems,” explained technician Chi-Linh Dinh. “Before, we used a very slow-form procedure of sending attachments at the end of each day. Now, all we do is add our information to the cloud and our coordinator has everything nicely synced up and ready to go.”
Dinh noted the company also uses Google Apps for business in conjunction with Google Drive, where everything is time stamped with the user who fixed the files.
As a result, this keeps all the modifications straight. The fact that the we have a backup copy of our files ensures that it doesn’t matter which techs on which days goes out to which sites; they can access the same information in the field as everyone else,” she added. “This boosts efficiency down the chain.”
With the world increasingly become more adept at focusing resources through online means, Zafiris pointed out everything will soon be accessible from everywhere, with no need to maintain local resources since someone else will do it for you.
Originally posted in TechPageOne.
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