Get Your Head in the Clouds. Why Franchisors Should Consider Abandoning Back Office Servers for Cloud-Based Solutions.

Using cloud-based services can lead to financial savings and more efficient operations

SPONSOREDUpdated 6:06AM • 04/29/16

As children, we were often reprimanded by our parents to "get our heads out of the clouds" — but that's exactly what many businesses are doing these days. For many companies, the decision to move to the cloud is a fairly simple one dictated by the financial strain associated with keeping enterprise-level IT up and running. Yet, what many businesses fail to realize is that moving to the cloud is not just about saving money, it's also a means of increasing productivity among your staff, while boosting your output performance.

According to the fourth annual State of the Cloud Survey by Right Scale, an industry leader in cloud portfolio management, cloud computing adoption continues to be a given with 93 percent of respondents reporting that they are adopting the cloud. Eighty-eight percent of respondents are using the public cloud and 63 percent are using the private cloud, with 58 percent using a mixture of both.

But why move to the cloud? It’s because traditional franchise software shouldn’t inhibit your brand’s growth. While efficiency and reduced costs are certainly two very desirable outcomes of moving to a cloud-based service, here are a few more to consider as well.

Disaster Recovery

Small businesses don’t always have the luxury of implementing large scale disaster recovery programs, but what the cloud allows them to do is implement backup and recovery solutions that save time and avoid large up-front expenditures while benefiting from the expertise of cloud managers.

Increased Collaboration

When your franchisees, executive team or even on-the-ground employees can access, edit and share documents anytime, and from anywhere, they’re able to do more together, and probably do it better. Cloud-based workflow and file sharing apps allow updates and information to be shared in real-time, which provides increased visibility and productivity.

Work from Anywhere

With today’s modern workforce and franchise systems spread out across the country and around the world, cloud computing allows you to be at work as long as you have an Internet connection. And with most cloud services these days, you’re not restricted by the device you’re using either.

Automatic Software Updates

Another benefit of cloud computing is that you are no longer burdened by a physical server and the regular maintenance needed to keep those machines working as efficiently as possible. Cloud suppliers now take care of software updates, including security updates, for you and automatically roll them out allowing you to focus more on the things that matter, like growing your business.

In the end, cloud-based computing is not just about improving underlying technology, it's about improving business efficiency and doing more with less.