Cloud Data Management is the process by which companies store, access, optimize and safeguard their data across multiple cloud platforms. Careful management of cloud data is critical for companies as they move more of their data onto the cloud. Cloud data management allows companies to easily visualize the state of all their data on a single management platform.
Companies used to rely on on-premises servers to meet their computing needs. The cloud promises to transform the way companies do business by seemingly limitless capacity and computing power. Access to the cloud is arranged through a third-party service provider such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), or Microsoft Azure.
Companies rarely transition to the cloud through a single cloud service provider. More commonly, certain parts of the business are more cloud-ready than others leading to various states of cloud adoption within the company. Managing all your company’s data across multiple cloud data platforms can be challenging and time-consuming. If a company’s cloud platforms are not managed right, a company could lose or compromise large amounts of its business-critical data.
Cloud data management streamlines and simplifies this process. Cloud data management allows organizations to focus on gaining insights from their data, instead of spending precious time sifting through mountains of data. This is time that could be better spent growing the company. Effective cloud data management needs to be thoughtfully executed.
Cloud Data Management Best Practices
Clarify Your Organization’s Goals with Moving to the Cloud
Different companies have different needs for their data. For some companies, especially startups, low cost is the ultimate driver. Housing their data on the public cloud would be the best option for cost-conscious businesses.
For companies with stricter security guidelines for handling sensitive information, such as financial and health records, a private cloud, hybrid cloud or multi cloud approach may be more suitable. Meanwhile, for organizations with data intensive workloads and applications, a high performance cloud platform is essential.
The more complex the cloud strategy, the greater the need for good cloud data management.
Develop Your Organization’s Cloud Strategy
Perhaps some of your computing still uses on-premises servers. If that’s the case, you need to define how much of your business infrastructure needs to be supported on the cloud. This planning is critical to a good cloud strategy. A clearly defined cloud strategy will help your company adopt a cloud platform that best suits the needs of the business. A cloud strategy clarifies how migrating to the cloud is in alignment with the company’s goals. This prevents duplicated efforts across the company.
Develop Your Organization’s Business Continuity Plan
If your data were to be lost or compromised in any way, how would that impact your ability to run your company? Cloud data management includes disaster recovery to prepare you for the worst case. Your data needs to be routinely backed up with the ability to failover quickly in the event of cloud service interruptions. Every backup copy takes up space on the public cloud resulting in your cloud bill ballooning out of control if not managed correctly. On the cloud, every byte counts. With Silk, you get the flexibility of cloud computing plus the cost savings of zero footprint instantaneous clones.
Develop Your Organization’s Cloud Security Guidelines
The security of the data hosted on your selected cloud platform can make or break your company. In certain industries that handle sensitive health or financial data, cloud security is a compliance requirement to operate. You first need to determine which data is most sensitive and/or critical for business continuity. Then, you need to select a cloud platform that meets or exceeds your security requirements. You also need to develop access levels to your data so that only the right people have access.
The public cloud has come a long way in beefing up security against cyber-attacks which can lead to data loss. The private cloud offers a dedicated cloud resource for the most stringent security concerns – but at a very high price. Adopting a hybrid or multi cloud strategy gives you the best of both worlds.
Cloud Data Management FAQs
What are the Benefits of Cloud Data Management?
Cost Optimization
As your organization starts to migrate their applications and workloads to the cloud, you need to keep in mind which cloud platform is best. For some organizations, including startups where cost is a concern, a public cloud platform may be best. For other organizations where security and high performance is business-critical, a private, hybrid or multi cloud strategy may be best.
Alignment to Business Goals
Cloud Data Management allows you to clarify how cloud computing will align with the overall goals of the business. You can build a data model that clearly shows how each part of your cloud infrastructure fits into the overall goals of the business. Does your business handle highly sensitive health and financial data? Does your company routinely use data intensive and mission-critical workloads and applications? Cloud data management addresses these questions with the cloud platform, multi cloud or hybrid cloud strategy that brings the greatest value to your organization.
Optimized Data Security & Compliance
Data security is important especially if your business handles sensitive health or financial data. Different cloud platforms offer different levels of security. Cloud data management allows you to develop the best pathway to host your data while providing optimum data security.
Business Continuity & Disaster Recovery
Cloud data management prepares you to handle the worst case if your business were to lose access to your data for any period of time. You can develop the frequency of backing up data that allows your business to quickly respond to data loss or compromise without affecting your end user experience. Managing these backups on the cloud is essential to keeping your cloud bills in check. Silk offers enterprise data services, such as zero footprint snapshots, deduplication, and thin provisioning, that reduce your cloud footprint, while allowing you to maintain backups that are critical to your business.
What is the difference between Cloud Storage and Cloud Data Management?
Cloud storage is where you store your data through an arrangement with a cloud service provider. Cloud data management is the way you manage your storage, access and security of your data across multiple cloud platforms.
How Silk Helps Your Cloud Data Management
Silk helps you to effectively manage your cloud resources across a hybrid or multi cloud environment. Since it is a virtualization layer that lives between your workloads and the underlying cloud infrastructure, it is easy to lift and shift data from one cloud to another or from on-premises to the cloud. With Silk, you can see every detail about your cloud data in-depth and in real time using Silk’s intuitive Flex Dashboard. You can scale up or scale down your cloud resources instantly using a simple drag and drop. Silk goes a step further and also monitors and manages the performance of all your cloud resources to ensure that your workload and applications are not experiencing performance degradation.
