Using cloud storage providers is an excellent way to secure and access your business data. The cloud provides scalable options for all your team members to collaborate effectively, whether in the office, on the field, or at home.

A report on cloud adoption by McAfee, a cybersecurity company, revealed that 87 percent of businesses experience rapid growth from cloud services, and 52 percent of organizations said they had better security with cloud services than with in-house IT environments.

However, when you have hundreds of cloud platforms seeking your business, how do you choose the best one? Here are some of the features to consider while picking your best cloud storage provider.

1. Amount of Storage Space

The essence of using cloud storage is to have ample and easily expandable storage for business data. If you know that your business operations will generate a large amount of data, you may not even know how much space to pay for initially.

That means you should choose a platform that allows for automatic quota adjustment. Ideally, the platform will alert you and increase your storage quota when you are about to exceed your storage limit.

2. Space Per User

Most businesses today involve some form of collaboration. Many employees now work from home, and they need to store and access files on your cloud storage service.

Pay attention to the way space and access are distributed per user. Some providers will allow all users to access the same storage space. Others charge you per user, allocating a sub cloud to each user. This arrangement may not suit your business.

If your users have diverse space needs or keep exceeding their space quota quickly, you may be better off with a storage subscription that allows all users to connect to the same storage space and charges you based on the total volume of storage used.

3. Data Security

Data in the cloud requires adequate protection from malware and hackers. While securing your data is a joint responsibility between you and the service provider, the provider must offer sufficient security infrastructure.

A significant security feature to look for is end-to-end encryption. Encryption protects your data from access even by the cloud provider. It means only your local device will be able to encrypt or decrypt the data you store in the cloud. Other security features to search for include secure sockets layer, which protects your information in transit.

4. 99.9 Percent Uptime Record

Technical issues occur with cloud storage systems as they do on in-house servers. But the best service providers take proactive steps to prevent most server failures. You can determine whether a provider will deliver the service you need by checking their uptime record.

Another way to know if a provider is serious about delivering the highest quality of service is to check their service level agreement. This agreement will make the provider commit to a minimum uptime and compensate you if they fail to meet their target within a particular month.

5. How Data Is Stored

A cloud service is not an amorphous body of water vapor without a physical address. When you transfer your data to a cloud provider, you move your business data to a data center with a specific address. To find out where your data will be stored.

Cloud storage near the location where you are likely to access data tends to be less efficient than those closer to you. So, for optimum performance, choose a service that stores your files in a place where you will have quick access times, especially when uploading or downloading large files.

Let’s Connect You to the Best Cloud Storage Provider

At Garden State Computing, we work with major cloud computing service providers. So, we have sifted the wheat from the chaff on your behalf.

Contact us today at 973-636-7350 to discover the best cloud providers and security solutions to protect your data.