So I previously wrote a blog which was the negative reciprocal of this blog- “top 5 reasons not to go on the cloud”. Which, in reality, I had trouble writing, as most of the evidence for today’s professional parks points toward moving their systems to the cloud. First off let’s have a little discussion about the concept of the “cloud”.
It is nothing more than some rented space on an actual offsite computer. That is it in a nutshell. That offsite computer is normally part of a large set of computers what are called “server farms”. In our case we use the Amazon cloud E3 Service. There are many other services out there (google, microsoft). We just found that when we started this about 7 years ago the Amazon service offered the best combination of value, service and security. We still belive it is today. We use it ourselves for the various servers we have configured for BookYourSite™ online bookings.
The Cloud computing business is now used by software companies such as ours for SAAS. That stands for Software As A Service. Fancy term meaning we manage, backup and upgrade your system at the appropriate time. If done correctly we feel is is perfect for rv park software and campground software.
So without further ado here are the five reasons:
- Security- Amazon is on top of their game when it comes to the security of your system on their servers. They have to be, without it, they are done. They spend more money on securing your data from online threats then you could every dream of spending on your locally hosted network.
- Backups- we handle all that now. Do not underestimate how important this is. I don’t mean just backing it up to a thumb drive. You must have off site back up for all your data. We have seen the other side and it is not pretty. Park offices burning down or getting flooded and people have not backed up their data. Very bad scene.
- Upgrades (new releases)- We handle all that now. Once we release a new version of Campground Manager Software@/ BookYourSite™ we upgrade you automatically at night. No need to call your local IT guy to come out to the park.
- Lower TCO- fancy word for Total Cost of Ownership. When you look long term and calculate all the costs involved with the local hosted which include; continual hardware upgrades, local IT guy visits, continual software upgrades, PCI compliance, annual support feastedmany more labour costs. All that goes away. Study after study has confirmed that SAAS is a lower cost option.
- Infrastructure Costs- An Internet connection is the all the infrastructure you need.
- Bonus Reason – Workplace flexibility. Is your park only open for 6 months? You can take reservations from the beach in Florida! (as long as you are connected to the internet) You do not have to mess around with moving your hard drive or data files onto your laptop before you head south.
We have been in this SAAS business for 7 years. Call us we can make it comfortable and simple for you to be on the cloud.
