What to consider for a successful cloud migration

Cloud migrations are one of the fasting growing digital transformation strategies that enable businesses to become more efficient and agile. But the rush to the cloud may mean that if certain steps aren’t followed, the migration won’t be as successful. We’ve highlighted key steps to consider for a seamless transition to the cloud.

Define a clear strategy

Before seeking professional support for your cloud journey, you need to define clear end goals and objectives that will be met along the way. What do you want to achieve and what are the main pain-points pushing you to look towards digital transformation? Think about the overall impact it needs to have on your business and your workforce.

Determine which applications to migrate

In order to determine which applications are fit for purpose in the cloud, your IT partner can work with you to carry out a granular analysis of your infrastructure. This will help them identify which applications can be migrated to the cloud, and which may perform better on either on private, hybrid or public cloud.

Decide on a computing model that aligns with your business

Every business operates differently and will require different cloud set ups, so you need to decide on a model that’s going to work best for your business. Think about what’s going to speed up your processes, make your performance more efficient and give you a competitive edge.

Serverless computing

Going serverless eliminates the management of infrastructure and allows faster application building.  Your IT partner will provision, scale and manage the infrastructure required to run the code. Taking this route will give you access to dynamic scalability and will reduce your TCO.

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)­

In a nutshell, taking the IaaS approach means your business will be renting infrastructure such as servers, network appliances and data centre – think of it as a virtual data centre! Taking this road means your business will only be paying for what’s being used, and you’ll be able to scale resources up/down as and when needed – resulting in reduced CapEx costs.

For example, your cloud provider will use a cloud computing platform like Microsoft Azure where the infrastructure is managed. With this you’ll be in charge of the purchasing the licensing or you can work with a reliable partner to see this through.

Software as a Service (SaaS)

SaaS essentially means the service is managed by the provider and you won’t have to think about the maintenance of the service and infrastructure – just how you plan to use the software.

Platform as a Service (PaaS)

This service requires your business to purchase resources from a cloud provider on a pay as you go basis, where you can access the resources over a secure internet connection.

The most important step…Work with a trusted cloud provider

One of the key steps to a successful migration is working with a provider who can understand your requirements, work with you as an IT partner, suggests tailored recommendations, and most importantly work with you to optimise your cloud environment along the way.

Not sure where to start with finding the right partner for you? Consider asking providers the following questions during your research:

• What cloud migration tools do you use to make the process more efficient?
• What does technical support look like during the migration process?
• Do you offer post-migration support?
• What security measures would be in place to ensure cloud security?
• Is training available for our staff to get familiarised with the new environment?
• Do you define SLA’s to ensure our requirements will be met?
• What is your history with downtime?#

Transitioning to the cloud is a complex process, so you need to be working with a strong IT partner that has the expertise and proven experience to carry out a large scale project.

Don’t forget about training!

Migrating to the cloud is great, but if your team doesn’t know how to use the new environment, then it’s going to cause issues in the future. A good IT partner will offer training, guides and workshops as part of the process to ensure you’re properly prepared.

Looking to move forward with your cloud migration project? Contact our cloud team to discuss your needs.