More business owners and IT leaders everywhere are moving on from legacy, on-premises IT infrastructures and turning to the cloud.
Cloud computing allows organizations to access applications and data over the internet, empowering them with greater flexibility and improved collaboration. In fact, about 94% of companies worldwide use cloud computing in some capacity, with 59% of businesses reporting a rise in cloud service costs over the past year.
But what does migrating to the cloud mean exactly, and why should you do so in the first place? In this blog post, we’ll discuss what cloud migration is and its benefits for your business. We’ll also guide you on migrating your IT infrastructure to the cloud and highlight certain pitfalls you want to avoid while doing so.
Cloud migration is the practice of relocating digital assets, applications, and their supporting technologies from an on-premises data center into the cloud, or from one cloud environment or provider to another.
An organization may abandon on-premises data centers due to the high cost of maintaining them. They also require significant resources to implement the necessary advanced security measures to protect sensitive data. On the other hand, businesses may choose to partner with a cloud service provider like Techmedics to leverage new cloud solutions and services that they haven't explored.
Let’s explore some of the benefits your business can enjoy by migrating to the cloud:
With an on-premises data center, you pay for all hardware, software licenses, and infrastructure setup, including physical security and cooling systems. On top of that, you also shoulder maintenance, upgrades, and your own IT staff.
In contrast, cloud solutions usually work like a pay-as-you-go model, which means only paying for the resources you actually use, instead of incurring a fixed upfront fee. What’s more, cloud providers like Microsoft or AWS oversee infrastructure management, significantly helping reduce your business’s IT costs.
With the cloud, documents and applications can easily be accessed using any internet-connected device (e.g., desktop, laptop, smartphone) in any location. As a result, employees can collaborate more seamlessly and efficiently, regardless of where they are located.
As your business needs evolve, the cloud allows you to quickly adjust computing resources like computing power, storage, and other capabilities. This mitigates the risk of overprovisioning or underutilization of resources and infrastructure.
Cloud services also give your organization access to cutting-edge technologies like artificial intelligence and server-less computing. Adopting these innovations helps you more efficiently develop and launch new products and services, giving you a competitive edge.
Cloud computing can also protect the integrity of your systems and data through technologies like access controls, encryption, data backup and recovery, and continuous system monitoring.
Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) hire top security experts and meet stringent regulatory standards (e.g., PCI DSS, GDPR, and HIPAA), streamlining compliance efforts for businesses.
By moving to the cloud, your business can take advantage of features like data replication and geographical redundancy. Data replication involves creating multiple copies of your data to ensure its availability. On the other hand, geographical redundancy distributes data across multiple locations.
These measures reduce the risks of downtime and ensure business continuity in case of localized outages, natural disasters, or other disruptions. If one data center becomes unavailable, for instance, your operations can simply shift to another location.
Now that you understand the key advantages of adopting the cloud, it’s time to learn how your organization using on-premises infrastructure can embrace it:
Before your business makes the move to the cloud, you need to take inventory of everything in your IT infrastructure. List all the important applications you and your employees use, the data you store, the data you have access to (e.g., customer information, files), and the hardware that powers your operations, such as servers and databases.
Next, determine how these components rely on one another within your IT infrastructure. For instance, one of your databases might support an application. If the database fails, how would that affect the application? Will it also impact other aspects of your IT system?
Finally, evaluate the costs, performance, and limitations of your current on-premises setup. Identify areas where the cloud can improve your business’s efficiency and scalability.
After assessing your environment, it’s time to plan how you’ll move to the cloud.
To start, establish your goals. What do you want to achieve by moving to the cloud? Do you aim to save money? The ability to handle more users? Or make your remote work setup more seamless? By identifying your end-goal, you ensure that the migration aligns with business needs and enables clear success metrics.
Once you’ve determined your end goal, you must identify your migration approach:
With your strategy and goals in place, you then need to define success metrics that will determine if your cloud migration has been successful in achieving your goals. For example, if your goal is cost reduction, your metric might be a 15% decrease in overall IT spending within the first-year post-migration. Or if security is your priority, a good success metric might be a 50% reduction in reported security incidents.
Security and compliance are critical during cloud migration as you’re entrusting your business’s valuable data and applications to a third-party environment. Without proper planning and implementation, you risk data breaches, and failure to meet regulatory requirements.
Some of the most effective security measures you can deploy during your transition to the cloud are access controls and encryption solutions such as multi-factor authentication platforms like Duo Security and encryption tools like BitLocker or AWS Key Management Service (KMS).
Access control platforms help you set up passwords, permissions, and authentication systems, while encryption entails transforming your data into a format that cybercriminals cannot read.
Take the time as well to understand the specific laws and rules that apply to your business and make sure your cloud setup follows them, using compliance automation tools like Microsoft Purview Compliance Manager and AWS Audit Manager.
If you run a healthcare business, for example, your cloud environment must be compliant with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, also known as HIPAA.
If you’re struggling to keep your cloud systems secure and compliant, you can seek the help of CSPs like Techmedics who will offer cloud solutions that meet your needs.
Before starting the migration process, you need to choose the right cloud environment for your business:
The best cloud environment among these three depends entirely on your organization’s needs, resources, and risk tolerance.
Now that you’ve defined your goals, addressed security concerns, and chosen your cloud environment, the next step is to create a migration plan.
Start by defining a timeline for migrating your applications and data. Prioritize those that are most important, complex, and dependent on other components. This can optimize your system’s functionality and free up resources for subsequent migration phases.
Next, identify the people responsible for each aspect of your migration. Assign tasks to specific individuals or teams and make sure everyone is familiar with their responsibilities.
Despite careful planning, some things may go wrong during your migration. Let’s say you experienced data corruption or loss during the transfer process. In such cases, a rollback plan allows you to revert to your pre-migration state while you address the issue. For instance, you could restore uncorrupted data from backups and identify the root cause of the problem. This helps you prevent further disruptions while you migrate to the cloud.
With everything ready to go, it’s time to commence your migration process. Remember to start with a small migration first — select a small dataset or nonessential app, migrate it to the cloud, and see if it transfers and functions properly. Troubleshoot any errors that may arise and perform the migration again. Once all problems have been resolved, proceed with a wider-scale migration.
Congratulations on transitioning your business to the cloud! But before the initial migration process is complete, there are some things you need to do:
As you can see, cloud migration is a complex process that involves a lot of planning, testing, and evaluation. As such, businesses can make mistakes that may override the benefits of cloud computing. Let’s look at some of the pitfalls you should avoid:
To avoid these pitfalls, make sure your migration strategy accounts for potential risks and dependencies and properly train your team on cloud-based workflows. Conducting a thorough cost analysis can help as well with identifying potential hidden expenses and optimizing your cloud spending.
Does it sound like you might need some guidance? Why not let a Cloud Service Provider like Techmedics assist with your business’s cloud migration? By partnering with us, we’ll identify your needs, select the ideal cloud environments, implement strong security solutions, and ensure your applications and data are ready for the cloud. Get a FREE consultation today.
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