Collaboration between teams can have its challenges — whether those teams are in different offices, different cities or different countries. Of course, the advent of Cloud hosting has made the task of connecting employees across multiple teams and locations a much less daunting possibility. But less daunting doesn’t mean it’s not still a major undertaking. So how do business managers ensure they’ve got the services and support their teams need to keep everyone connected and communicating?
The short answer is managed Azure services. Unless you live under a rock — a rock on another planet — you know Microsoft is the first name in enterprise software. And Azure, its Cloud offering, has quickly risen to be the number one choice for businesses using Cloud. As of last year, 57% of Fortune 500 companies relied on Azure for at least part of their Cloud solution. Why is it so popular? There are a number of reasons: managed Azure Cloud services offer first-rate security and support, implementation is easy, and of course, many companies already use Microsoft products in house, making integration between on-premise and Cloud systems simple and efficient.
But wait — I just said that over half of Fortune 500 companies chose Azure for at least part of their Cloud solution — what does that mean? What about the other parts? As Hybrid Cloud becomes the default choice for companies using Cloud, how will you make sure that your team (in a single office or scattered far and wide) and your systems (on Azure, in Private Clouds, or in-house) are all secure, connected, and performing optimally? Ah, that’s the tricky part – and that’s where it becomes important to distinguish having managed Azure Cloud services from simply having Azure.
Keeping Up with Cloud with a Trusted Partner
The Cloud is great — it’s a game-changer for many organizations — but it’s also rapidly changing and hard to keep track of if you’re not an expert. Teaming up with the right managed Azure Cloud services provider can mean a world of difference for your teams when the pressure is on or the workload spikes. There are already a lot of challenges to managing projects that rely on multiple teams, but by outsourcing your Cloud or IT requirements to a trusted partner, your infrastructure availability and connectivity won’t be one of them.
What Can You Get from a Managed Azure Cloud Services Provider?
1. The Highest Availability
Nothing is ever perfect, but combining the power of Azure with the support of managed hosting gets about as close to perfection as you can in the Cloud world.
Microsoft has data centers in 22 regions and 140 countries around the world and that can offer a lot of benefits to Azure users. If an outage or natural disaster is affecting even a large area around you, your data can be served from another unaffected location without interruption or delay to your teams. It also allows you to route users to the data center closest to them to keep latency low and performance optimal.
Combine that raw Cloud power with the proactive monitoring and maintenance that comes from partnering with a managed Azure Cloud services provider, and you can rest easy that, on the rare occasion your systems are affected by outages, errors, or attacks, the issue will be addressed rapidly and effectively to keep your business humming along as usual. In fact, more often than not, problems will be solved before you even know they exist — and that means fewer interruptions, better productivity and good news for your bottom line.
2. Comprehensive Pre- and Post-Launch Support
A good managed Azure Cloud services partner isn’t just there to sell you their product. Resellers exist, of course, and there is nothing wrong with the product they sell. But the managed Cloud provider you really want isn’t a sales team – they are partners. A Cloud solution implementation includes a lot of small tasks that may not really be on your team’s radar, but can mean the difference between success and failure. The types of services you can expect from a high-quality managed Azure Cloud services partner are:
- CDN setup and configuration
- Load and performance testing
- Application testing and optimization
- Vulnerability scans
- Disaster recovery and backup setup
- Replication
When you team with a managed Azure Cloud services provider who understands that performance and availability are critical to your organization’s success, you’ll get more than just the great product that is Azure – you’ll get a great partner before, while, and after you make the move to the Cloud.
3. Seamless Integration
Remember we talked earlier about the number of Fortune 500 companies relying on Azure as part of their Cloud solution? Hybrid is the new Cloud, and the majority of companies using Cloud are combining Public Cloud, Private Cloud, co-located and dedicated servers to create the infrastructure solutions they need. And that’s where managed Azure Cloud services providers really get to shine.
Microsoft Azure systems are obviously designed to work with other Microsoft products, and odds are your company is already relying on one or more of those products. Choosing Azure reduces the need to train users on new systems, as the UI remains familiar and compatibility is built in. Choosing managed Azure means you don’t even need to worry about finding systems that will shake hands and play nicely together – your managed services partner can support and maintain your Azure, Private Cloud, or in-house infrastructure to ensure all your systems are running smoothly.
Get a Managed Azure Expert on Your Side
Regardless of whether you have a small or medium-sized business, or even if you are part of a larger enterprise, managed Azure Cloud services can become an extension of your IT department. When you are concentrating on growing your sales and operations locally, nationally, or globally, the last thing you need is worries about whether your infrastructure can support your team’s growth and development.
You want more than just a hosting company — you want a provider you can rely on for expertise, service, and support. At PointClick, we don’t think of you as a customer, we think of you as a partner in business. For more information on how our managed Azure Cloud services can benefit your business, get in touch with us today.
