In a highly competitive technological landscape, SMEs need to be agile and responsive to the market to stay at the forefront of innovation. What exactly do they want? 

• Enhanced collaboration 
• Rich data insights 
• Personalized customer experience 
• Innovative offerings 

These needs accelerated SMEs’ transition to cloud services technology. Cloud infrastructure eliminates the need to create and maintain physical infrastructure, including hardware purchases that store files or multimedia content. There will be no space for servers or the cooling system expenses required. In fact, cloud services enable data accessibility from anywhere using an internet connection, which facilitates data sharing and collaboration.  

In the same vein, cloud infrastructure helps SMEs overcome tech modernization challenges, especially non-IT firms. They are: 

• Balancing resource allocation between IT modernization and core business functions. 
• Meeting in-house skill gaps for effective implementation.  
• Going digital is prone to security attacks and vulnerabilities.

The best management and usage of cloud resources allow businesses to harness the full potential of cloud technology even through low-end laptops without requiring hardware upgrades. According to research, 44% of SMEs with less than 1000 staff use cloud infrastructure such as AWS, Azure, or Snowflake for off-site support. The range of benefits helps SMEs maximize efficiency and leapfrog the competition. 

As a forward-thinking entrepreneur, if you are looking for cloud services leverage, this blog will walk you through the capabilities of cloud services that benefit SMEs in distinct ways. Thus, seize an extra edge in the fierce competition.  

Five ways SMEs can gain competitive advantage using cloud services

Cloud services, that’s infrastructure as a service, allow SMEs to build and maintain IT infrastructure, enabling easier access to computing resources such as storage, servers, and networking. SMEs can reap a myriad of advantages by harnessing the power of the cloud with the help of cloud consulting companies. It further allows SMEs to get ahead of the pack, which we will explore in detail.

Affordable infrastructure 

SMEs always look for the technology that requires minimum investment and benefits them at scale. With the elimination of physical infrastructure, cloud services help SMEs to set up cloud infrastructure at reduced cost and stay profitable in different ways. 

1. Pay-as-you-go: With the pay-as-you-go model, SMEs only need to pay for the computing resources used. Small businesses only need to pay more for extra resources when additional resources are required for scaling operations. It reduces expenditure by a large fraction. 
2. Say no to maintenance cost: It relieves SMEs from hardware maintenance and security costs, which they can invest in strategic cloud initiatives.  
3. Cost projection: SMEs with limited budgets can estimate the cost of cloud technology leverage. A subscription-based model enables cost prediction so that cost is best managed, which is impossible when done traditionally.  

Meet growing demands with scalability. 

High and low tides are an integral part of the SME’s growth journey. Based on the requirements, the use of resources increases and decreases. For example, Ecommerce businesses require additional computing resources dynamically to handle the increasing number of requests without impacting performance. Cloud services help businesses meet the variation in requirements dynamically and stay competitive with their capabilities. 

1. Win with elasticity: Cloud services are so elastic that they accommodate the changing resource needs of SMEs just the way elastic changes its shape when stretched and released.. During steady growth or fluctuation, cloud services provide resources accordingly.   
2. Faster deployment: Cloud services are deployed quickly as they can be set up within a few minutes. Hence, it allows SMEs not to lose opportunity and harness the maximum potential of technology.  

Enable remote working with flexibility 

16% of SMEs operate entirely remotely, which shapes the working environment across the globe. With cloud services, SMEs are quickly adapting to the dominant trend to stay aligned with changing market conditions and make great strides in the competitive world. 

• Accessible everywhere: With the gradual shift towards remote working, 32.6 million Americans will be working remotely by 2025. The steady rise in remote work requires accessing data anywhere. Cloud services facilitate accessing data worldwide over the internet connection, which allows a globally distributed workforce to work collaboratively.   
• Leverage collaboration tools: Seamless communication and collaboration stays at the heart of remote working. Collaboration tools such as video conferencing tools, file sharing tools, and others from cloud services allow teams of different geographical nations to work together. It helps 98% of SMEs that are planning to conduct job interviews remotely.  
• Enable disaster recovery: Cloud services provide a disaster recovery plan that ensures data backup is continuously taken along with data centralization and scalable storage. The data backup capabilities enable SMEs to work ceaselessly without unforeseen circumstances.  

Helps stay secure and compliant 

43% of SMEs face cyberattacks every year, which has made them spend between $826 and $653,587 million on cybersecurity incidents. Only 14% of SMEs are prepared with some form of technology, such as the cloud, to face such attacks. Cloud services ensure SMEs are saved from phishing attacks, ransomware, and data breaches and tighten security with national compliance implementation following different methods.  

• Encrypt data from end-to-end: Cloud services ensure the data is locked with a key that’s encrypted and decrypted by the people having special privileges to access data. This way, SMEs can maintain data integrity and confidentiality among staff with different roles and responsibilities.  
• Making SMEs audit-ready: Making SMEs roll out digital transformation business-wide while adhering to national compliance and regulations is essential to operate without legal issues. Cloud services help SMEs to get compliance-ready and focus on core competencies that let them cut through the noise.  
• Implement security measures: Cloud services have answers to all the advancing cyber frauds with continuous monitoring, firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and others. It helps protect users’ data and eliminates expenses associated with extra security mechanisms. AI tools automate threat detection and instantly respond to security threats for proactive actions.  

Create sustainable environment 

Gone are the days when SMEs only focused on growth. Presently, they are investing in technology to make the environment better and sustainable. Cloud services are one of the gems that add valuable contributions to reducing environmental impact. 

• Minimizing electronic waste: Cloud services allow SME teams to work and use cloud resources on low-end devices that consume less energy compared to high-end devices. The sustainability effort mitigates environmental impact. 
• EEE (Environmental energy efficiency): The cloud’s capability to share resources among multiple users helps SMEs reduce energy consumption and carbon footprint.  

Future trends in cloud services 

Cloud computing helps SMEs achieve competitive growth and enormous success by allowing them to innovate, improve customer service, and increase team engagement levels. The upcoming trends, such as serverless cloud computing, artificial intelligence, hybrid cloud solutions, and Kubernetes, potentially catalyze SMEs’ achievements. Harness the power of cloud services with the help of cloud computing companies to operate, empower teams, and gain competitive advantage effectively. Cloud is here to stay, so let’s elevate your business with cloud services!