As a small business running an online store or a company website, the last thing that you wanna spend time, money and effort is managing your servers. That is why the best solution is to go for fully managed hosting services. But what are fully managed hosting services? You may have probably come across the word managed hosting several times or might have seen it on a bunch of hosting providers website while doing your research. In this article we will go into details to find out the real monetary benefits of managed dedicated hosting services and how does it help small businesses.
In layman terms, Managed Hosting means the hosting provider takes care of all your server related issues. You not only rent the hardware from the host but also pay them for managing it. It is similar to getting a full warranty with free oil change and maintenance when buying a new car. In Unmanaged hosting, you just rent the server from the hosting provider, and are yourself responsible for its service and maintenance.
In order to discuss the benefits of Managed Hosting, I ll break it down into two parts: Technical Benefits & Business Benefits. Lets start with the technical benefits first
Technical Benefits of Managed Hosting
– Server Monitoring:
Server monitoring is extremely critical for your organization. It is a process of constantly scanning the servers to search for any irregularities of failures. System admins constantly monitor the servers to find such points of failures so that they could fix them before it becomes a major problem. Its is like the saying, precaution is better than cure. To have a good server uptime and network availability system admins are present onsite to constantly look after the servers. Now imagine doing this yourself!
– Security:
Server security is the number one priority for any business. Server security covers various aspects of security under its umbrella such as running security audits, spam filtering, virus scanning, software firewall configuration, OS updates and much more. Hosting providers are well equipped with various tools and tons of experience to deal with server security related issues. They constantly scan the operating system and core application to find security vulnerabilities which they can fix and prevent the server from being attacked
– Managed Storage:
Storage requirements of a company changes from time to time. The amount of space needed now by an organization may not be the same that they would need few years or months down the line. Managed Storage means outsourcing a company’s storage needs to a managed services provider. This is beneficial of the company as it help them reduce the cost related to buying a administrating storage services
– Managed Database:
This is very much on the same lines as Managed Storage. However in place of system admins, the company now uses the skills and experience of an experience DBA. The DBA acts as a consultant to design the best database system as per your needs and requirements. Hosting providers normally have DBA’s who are experiences in SQL Server, MySQL and Oracle so as a company you will definitely find the expertise that you need.
– Backups:
Loss in data can prove costly for a company. It is therefore essential to have a process that regularly backups your data, keeps its secure and preserves its integrity. As per a survey it is said that in case of a man-made or natural disaster, small business loose more than 50% of their data. With managed services, you as a business owner can have the piece of mind that your data is secure and backedup because your hosting provider has process and procedures in place to deal with such scenarios.
Now that we have looked at some of the technical benefits of managed hosting, lets look at some of the business benefits.
Business Benefits of Managed Hosting
– Customized as per your needs:
Every company has separate needs, and managed hosting solutions are not one size fits all. You can get a solution customized as per your needs. This is good because based on your budget you can work with your hosting provider to choose the service that best fits your needs and the ones which are the most critical to you.
– Reduce Operation Cost:
A small business owner has lot of expenses to manage. Hiring system admins, DBA to do server and database management is an added expense for the company. It is in the best interest of the company to hire a hosting partner that has such experience people to take care of all the server related issues.
– Save Time and Money:
In business Time is money. If as a small business owner you are spending most of your time managing the servers and then you will be able to spend less time concentrating on your core business. There are only 24hours in a day and you cant get spend time focusing on different things, the only thing you need to concentrate and focus on should be how to grow your business.
So I hope now you have a better understanding of what managed hosting services are and how they are beneficial to you as a company. Sometimes it is best to let the Experts do their job.
