As the expenses of building and maintenance of an IT framework carry on rising, more business organizations are shifting their data and applications to a cloud-based framework and the advancement of revitalized metamorphic technology as well as innovative designs of the intuitive user interface are charging up the assumptions of cloud services.

And undoubtedly, specified that cloud computing services provide reliability, flexibility, and accessibility which were earlier inaccessible to IT departments. 

What Are The Cloud-Based Services?

The term cloud-based services are a bit extensive. It refers to IT resources that vendors provide over cyberspace. These cloud-based services can transpire via private, public, or hybrid clouds (hybrid clouds are a combination of both private and public clouds).

Service providers are responsible for delivering 100 percent uptime for the cloud computing services so that the users can have accessibility and consumption data at any time.

Cloud computing services deliver this at any place in retrieving data and information with the help of an internet connection.

In the current business climate, business owners must be able to access the data and applications from tablets, laptops, mobile phones, and computers whether it’s in an office setup or outside the data center or company like in the field or road.

Web Services Or Cloud Services- Which Is Better? 

There exist some basic differences that segregate web services and cloud services. Well, a web service refers to an API or Application Programming Interface that offers data and information for the consumption of applications.

On the other hand, a cloud service refers to a service or application offering remote assets as a service for customer consumption.

However, we can say that web services and cloud services are quite similar but they are not innately the same.

Web services provide various methods to IT developers such as how to merge a web application over cyberspace and how they permit companies to share data without requiring mandatory access to the web systems beyond the firewall of the business organization.

Whereas, cloud services offer the accessibility of server frameworks that the service provider can direct or handle.

Moreover, cloud services also provide scalability, data privacy and security, data storage, data access, reliability and autonomy, quality control, efficiency, system update management, and many more that can benefit a modern business organization nowadays.

Cloud-Based Services Are Better Than Hosted Solutions 

Cloud computing services are software or applications that are remotely accessible and hosted on the cloud provider’s server instead of the user’s.

Furthermore, cloud-based services are digital services that permit the customers to allocate fixed storage to keep and manage data for any kind of business with the assurance of total security whether it’s small or big.

A simple way to reflect on this is still thinking about the software being on-stage, but it happens totally to be remotely accessible as well. 

On the other hand, service providers provide hosted solutions in various ways. One of them is when a company buys a solution without any charge and takes the whole responsibility to handle and direct it.

Another one is when a service provider from a third party offers a hosted solution and controls the physical servers that direct the program elsewhere.

Generally, via the internet or through direct networking, a user achieves accessibility to the hosted solutions. 

Well, while remaining cost-effective extensibility of solutions is the biggest benefit of cloud-based services.

In addition, in case of speed, updates, and data privacy and security features, cloud services are more up-to-date as compared to hosting solutions.

“Software as a Service” or SaaS is a good example of a cloud-based service.

Besides, in the case of hosted solutions, you may not have access to your data or the website sometimes, especially when the private server goes down. 

Traditional Process And Cloud Based Process 

Traditional Process

In the case of Traditional Web Hosting, IT developers use a physical server space to direct the web hosting needs of the customers. Services are either shared or dedicated through the traditional hosting process where every option involves its own merits. 

Dedicated hosting is quite expensive and its servers have particular amounts of memory, bandwidth, processing power, and hard drive space, and here the customer has to pay for the entire server.

Whereas in the case of Shared Hosting, IT experts have made a single server for the companies to share among the staff and each client pays for a particular amount of the server’s storage capacity and the clients can also share its bandwidth. It costs a bit lower than a dedicated hosting one.

Well, the traditional process consists of 2 options. They are as follows-

Purchase A Solution:

When cloud services didn’t exist, the companies whether small or big at that time mostly relied on their solutions in-house or on-stage, limited within the data center. A company once purchasing the solution, will have to pay for the maintenance of the entire server. In-house, servers permit the access of data only for physical control of the programming and backup processing. For having access to data, they don’t have to depend on an internet connection though. Moreover, for medium and small businesses it can be quite cost-effective.

Use A Third Party:

However, many organizations decide to use third-party hosting to shift from the traditional process as the third party provides disaster recovery, level of uptime (which is more or less assured in the contract), and maintenance of hardware at a low cost. 

Cloud-Based Processes: 

As we mentioned before, cloud-based services refer to software or applications that are remotely accessible and hosted on the cloud provider’s server rather than the client’s. This process offers virtual server space for every customer; here you have to pay only for those services you need. It is expandable which provides excellent uptime for data processing and IT developers build it in such a way that multiple servers can handle the load.  

Data privacy and security, managing cost, and segregation are the major challenges of a cloud computing process. Besides these, cloud-based processes include governance and control of data and information, expertise assets, building a private cloud, directing multiple clouds at a time, performance, compliance, flexibility, reliability, etc. 

Now, if we compare traditional processes with cloud-based processes then, most enterprises can progress their business with cloud-based services as it’s more beneficial with a higher degree of resilience and security access. 

Top 25 cloud-based services by type  

Project Management  

Asana  

Asana is an example of a cloud-based service which permits the employees of a business’ workspace to maintain and track communication regarding their projects efficiently. The employees have the option to view the workflow of the project, and goals as well as collaborate with other employees to work through a timeline and keep up with the progress.  

Trello 

Trello is a very efficient cloud-based platform which allows one to get an overview of the running project as well as who is working on it. Other than that one can also log there about the progress of the project and how far along is it from being ready. Anyone has the ability to use Trello across organizations and can manage the project without the help of any complex or unnecessary tools.

Basecamp 

Basecamp is a cloud-based and web-based project management platform with a wide range of features that come in handy when collaborating with other teams as it gives restriction-free environment interaction—with a smooth interface and user-friendly design to do task management, message other team members and share files internally and externally more efficiently.

Smartsheet

With Smartsheet you’ll get a spreadsheet-style interface which manage the workflow while providing you a lot of flexibility. One can easily track the progress of any particular project by simply subscribing to a sheet. One can also opt for the subscription of just a row on that spreadsheet.

Clarizen

Clarizen offers a workflow that is configurable. You can customize the workflow with Clarizen very easily so that the organization can ensure that the necessity of that company is being met. Other than this, you’ll get automated business processes along with dynamic reports, dashboards and real-time visibility.

Customer Relationship management

Salesforce

Another cloud-based platform is Salesforce which offers different software products and solutions so that users can create and dispense customized software. The communication of a company and the data regarding a consumer is effortless to access with Salesforce. Salesforce also allows marketing, support departments and sales to get a consumer’s history in a portal that is easy to access.

HubSpot

Through HubSpot, you can track a sales lead and organize it at the same time. You can also store the information of your customer. The portal is a combination of CRM and marketing but the advantage is that you can go back and forth between these two functions with HubSpot.

Pipedrive

Pipedrive allows an organization to supervise the sales activity. You can manage the business leads with its easy user interface and straightforward features. You get an open AI system and have the ability to manage workflows of your project on the fly so you can work cohesively with different business systems.

Nimble

Nimble betters the social media presence of a company. You also get mobile-based sales automation along with browser widget to track your business’ communication. Nimble also helps consolidate every data pertaining to an individual customer.

Insightly 

Another cloud-based platform which is also a lead management solution that is perfect for small to medium-sized businesses. You can do email tracking, extended workflow management abilities. You get access to some mobile applications through Insightly and it’ll generate web form that’ll help you maintain a sales lead.

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) 

NetSuite

This is a scalable and complete cloud solution which helps automate business processes. With NetSuite you get one single integrated system that’ll cover all the business management software of your customer.

SAP ERP 

If you want to synchronize the business processes with the help of real-time software, SAP’s ERP is the one. It also features a easy comprehensive portfolio for all types of businesses. It is extremely flexible to meet a company’s needs and one can customize to do so.

Deskera 

Deskera covers it all – from customer management to sales. It also allows the users to supervise the complete information on purchase including the data regarding stock levels, orders, etc. with easy to manage user interface, Deskera is good for all types of businesses.

Acumatica

Acumatica features adaptable mobile-based ERP which targets small businesses. This platform is useful to achieve flexibility and functionality for different business processes such as customizable screen, dashboard, a centralized management system and many more.

Epicor 

The ERP solution of Epicor offers disaster recovery, backup and user support along with quick time to value and market. You can customize its services to enhance productivity. Businesses in distribution and manufacturing industries gain the most advantages with Epicor but it is greatly useful for multi-site or single site company worldwide.

Human Resource Management (HRM)

BambooHR

It features employee self-service and offers track of human resources data. Easy to use intuitive interface makes the workflow easy with any software quickly accessible. It also documents the storage from performance assessments to health forms.

Sage Business Cloud People

Sage Business Cloud People targets large companies that deal with foreign operations while providing the HR team with complete transparency over the company’s global workforces. The HR system of Sage is enterprise-level that features a centralized database covering actionable reports.

Namely

If you want a highly customizable HR platform which has a single system. It designed a function that is capable of automating tasks and assign processes that were a burden earlier so now the employees will have more time to work on other valuable assets of the company.

Deputy 

Deputy features a rostering application which helps companies to develop schedules to get an exact calculation of the overtime and time the staff hours. It is also very flexible that comes with mobile application for both the android and iOS devices.

Zoho People 

Zoho people also covers a wide range of services such as time trackers, leave management. Employee self-service, attendance management, and many other HR functions. Companies can get great benefits from using Zoho People to customize leave types while the employees can access the platform easily to submit their leave online.

Messaging Applications

Slack

The online collaborative tools Slack allows teams to assemble together and helps streamline communication. Companies use ti to improve efficiency because it allows quicker response time than E-mail. In Slack, communication happens through channels and one can categorize it in topic, name, project and other ways.

Google Hangouts

Google Hangouts is more popular among the other cloud-based solutions for its quick and easy user interface that lets people have video call, messaging and phone call to other people. Recently, google divided it into two – Hangout Chat and Hangouts Meet. In Hangouts Chat, team members can message and in Hangouts Meet, the video and audio communications take place.

WhatsApp

A mobile Application for iOS and the Android, WhatsApp lets its users to chat, video call, phone call other team members and you can communicate with multiple people at once. It features end-to-end encryption and there is no messaging fee.

Firebase Cloud Messaging 

FMC or Firebase Cloud Messaging is the new name of Google Cloud Messaging. FMC is a cross-platform application for messaging and it runs on the Android, iOS as well as web applications without any cost.

Flock 

Flock is similar to Slack in some aspects. It is also a group collaboration platform where multiple team members can interact through messaging or one-on-one messaging. A company can create a channel based on whatever topic they seem fit. Flock’s intuitive interface develops a space for enhanced streamlined communication.

The Bottom Line

Cloud computing services provide a higher degree of flexibility and where data is accessible at any time because of the distributed atmosphere even if one or more than one server goes down. In these present days, with such a development in the pervasiveness of cloud adoption and cloud computing services, we can say that we are enjoying living in the golden era of cloud computing services.

 

 

 

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