Cloud Monitoring Can Be the Difference Maker for SMBs

Cloud Monitoring Can Be the Difference Maker for SMBs

Cloud Monitoring Can Be the Difference Maker for SMBs

It’s a fast-paced world. Not only do people want things, they want things right now. This sometimes-unnerving need for instant satisfaction has only intensified now that we have Wi-Fi and mobile devices that keep us connected regardless of where we are, what we’re doing, or the time of day. There is no longer any tolerance whatsoever for waiting. A business with a website that fails to load, or loads too slowly, will lose customers and leads to competitors.

So what has your business done to address this need for constant accessibility and optimal uptime? Do you feel you’re doing enough to meet the demands and expectations of your customers, new business prospects and those who have just now found you on Google?

If you’re a small-to-medium sized business owner, do you have confidence in your technology infrastructure? Can you say with certainty that your website, internal server, and mobile applications function smoothly, efficiently, and correctly?

When your IT team leaves work to go live their lives, are you confident that things won’t go bump in the night? That you won’t be ringing their cell phone while they’re out having dinner with their family, or worse yet, sleeping?

If you answer no to these questions, you may be one of the many small business owners who could benefit from cloud monitoring. And you’ll be pleased to learn that cloud monitoring can significantly improve all facets of your business – especially your service, productivity, reputation, and profitability.

What is the Cloud?

According to a study conducted by Wakefield Research, 54% of those questioned responded that they’ve never used cloud technology. However, the truth is that they’re in the cloud everyday when they bank or shop online and send or receive email.

Business owners, specifically non tech savvy small business decision makers, are still apprehensive when it comes to moving their server and web monitoring services to the cloud.  But FDR’s famous quote, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” definitely applies here.  The cloud is nothing more than moving the storage and access of your data programs from a computer’s physical hard drive to the web. There is nothing to fear.

Benefits of Cloud Monitoring

Obviously, these physical and virtual servers, their shared resources, and the applications they run on, must be monitored. This can be done from multiple remote locations and it’s called cloud monitoring.

Cloud monitoring makes it easier to identify previously unseen patterns and potential problems within your infrastructure–issues that may be too difficult for any in-house support staff to detect. For instance, monitoring ensures that your site is delivering accurate page content and is meeting anticipated download speeds. It can detect unapproved changes, website tampering, and compromised data.

The continuous analyzing and testing of your network, website, and mobile applications can reduce downtime by as much as 80%. The speed and functionality of e-commerce transactions are also optimized. Additionally, cloud monitoring tests your email server at regular intervals, which minimizes failure deliveries and other issues pertaining to sending and receiving emails.

Clearly, all of the above, along with the alerts that help identify and fix issues before they become catastrophes, make cloud monitoring an attractive way to gain insight into how end-users experience your site, while also enhancing their overall experience.

Is That A Business Continuity Plan in Your Pocket…Or A Bunch of Jargon?

Is That A Business Continuity Plan in Your Pocket…Or A Bunch of Jargon?

Is That a Business Continuity Plan in Your Pocket or a Bunch of Jargon?

Technology is full of difficult jargon. To further complicate things, certain terms are often used in a different context between one publication or service provider and the next. An example of this is the usage of backup, disaster recovery, and business continuity. These terms are commonly used interchangeably, often resulting in confusion. In an effort to alleviate some of this confusion, let’s describe each physical process. You will see an overlay among all three, although they are each different processes.

Backup – In IT lingo, the most basic description of backup is the act of copying data, as in files or programs, from its original location to another. The purpose of this is to ensure that the original files or programs are retrievable in the event of any accidental deletion, hardware or software failure, or any other type of tampering, corruption and theft.

It’s important to remember that the term “backup” refers to data only and doesn’t apply to the physical machines, devices, or systems themselves. If there were a system failure, disk crash, or an onsite physical disaster, all systems would still have to be replaced, rebuilt, and properly configured before the backed-up data could be loaded onto them.

Disaster Recovery – Backups are a single, albeit crucial, component of any disaster recovery plan. Disaster recovery refers to the complete recovery of your physical systems, applications, and data in the event of a physical disaster like a fire; hurricane or tornado; flood ; earthquake ; act of terror or theft.

A disaster recovery plan uses pre-determined parameters to define an acceptable recovery period. From there, the most satisfactory recovery point is chosen to get your business up and running with minimal data loss and interruption.

Business Continuity – Although backup and disaster recovery processes make sure that a business can recover its systems and data within a reasonable time, there is still the chance of downtime from a few hours to many days. The point of a business continuity plan is to give businesses continuous access to their technology and data, no matter what. Zero or minimal downtime is the goal.

Critical business data can be backed up with configurable snapshots that are instantly virtualized. This allows files, folders and data to be turned on and restored in seconds. Bare metal restores of hardware, where an image of one machine is overlaid onto a different machine, is also utilized along with cloud replication for instant off-site virtualization.

Many businesses also keep redundant systems and storage at a different physical location than their main site as part of their business continuity process. They may also outline procedures for staff to work remotely off-site. Some businesses or organizations may go as far as to have printed 

“That will never happen to me.  It’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

“That will never happen to me. It’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

Small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are the prime target for attackers because they tend to be easier targets. They’re often less secure and unprepared for attack. Think about burglars that go after houses where they know no one is home. With more cybercrime automation and the rise of hacking kits, the cost and time it takes to launch a successful attack have decreased, increasing the amount of cyber-attacks executed.

You, like many SMBs, may not think you are a target.

82 percent of SMBs say they’re not targets for attacks as they don’t have anything worth stealing (Towergate Insurance)

However, 55 percent of SMB respondents have experienced a cyber-attack in the past year, and another 50 percent have experienced a data breach involving customer and employee information (2016 State of SMB Cybersecurity).

You may underestimate the value of your information.

It doesn’t always seem like it, but every business has data worth stealing. Did you know that the average cost per lost or stolen record is $158? It may not seem like a lot, but this number grows quickly once these records are stolen by the hundreds (Cost of Data Breach Study).

This means you might not be prepared to defend yourself.

Did you know that 79 percent of small businesses do not have an incident response plan? Without one, you may never be able to fully recover when a security incident becomes a reality (Nationwide Cyber Security Survey).

 However, the consequences are significant and often business-crippling.

An IBM and Poneman Institute study found that the average cost of a data breach has increased to a staggering $3.79 million (Cost of Data Breach Study).

 Similarly, 60 percent of companies that lose their data due to an attack or disaster will shut down within six months (Boston Computing Network).

Work with an MSP to receive the data protection you need.

Invest in an outsourced cybersecurity solution to protect against the expanding cyber threat landscape, and mitigate damages inflicted upon your business. Gain the expertise, technology and support you may be lacking, and grow your IT budget without growing your payroll.


Work with us today!

Tech Quick Tips   5 Ways to Stay Secure Online

Tech Quick Tips 5 Ways to Stay Secure Online

1. Hook up to a network that you know.

Free Wi-Fi is tempting, but be sure that you consider who is providing the connection. Public connections at the local coffee shop are usually unsecured and leave your machine open to outsiders. While these networks provide a convenience, there are risks to be aware of.

 

2. Bank and shop with caution.

Shopping from familiar websites is a good place to start. Stick with the reputable sites that are tried and true – like Amazon or eBay. Also, when checking out and finalizing the purchase, look for the ‘padlock’ symbol or the abbreviation ‘https’ in the address bar at the top of your browser. This will ensure that you are on a secure, encrypted part of this webpage. Keeping an eye on your bank statements for suspicious activity is always a good idea, among these other best practices for shopping online.

 

3. Use secure passwords.
Passwords for logging into any website should contain a mix of letters, numbers, and special characters – as well as be different for each website that you log into. It can definitely be a pain to remember all of these passwords, but ask yourself which is more of a pain – remembering these, or recovering stolen personal information.

 

4. Lock Your Computer.
When you walk away from your machine, lock it. In Windows, it is as easy as pressing the Windows key + L. On an Apple Mac, pressing “Control+Shift+Eject” will do the trick (unless you do not have an optical drive, then you can hit the “Power” key instead of “Eject”). This practice would be the equivalent to deadbolting the front door of your home. It acts as a deterrent to the bad guys as well as a line of defense. It may even be worth setting up a password lock on your Apple or Windows machine as well.

 

5. Do not click on anything unfamiliar.
If an offer is too good to be true, it probably is. If you get an email from an unknown source, do not click any of the links within it – and immediately report it to your IT department. If a window pops up while browsing a website, immediately close it. Familiarity is always your friend. Using your judgment and trusting your gut is the ultimate defense when online. Always play it safe!