4 things IT should think about for cloud projects

A recent Spiceworks survey (their most recent State of SMB IT report) shows a rise in interest in using cloud in the SMB space, and coincidently, a Microsoft survey showed the same thing – there must be something to it 😉 Spiceworks’ report says that with 42% of SMB IT pros planning on using cloud services by mid-2011, which is a nice jump since 2010 – not to mention a good percentage on its own. And, as the chart shows above shows, a hefty chunk of budget is dedicated to “online services.”

As part of the commentary pieces I’m doing with Spiceworks, I wrote-up some high-level guidelines for those who are looking to start using cloud services. I keep these brief, so they’re not uber-detailed, just things to think about as you’re evaluating cloud.

Here’s the summary list:

• Let cost be your guide
• Focus on what cloud enables, not just what it replaces
• If it ain’t broke, don’t cloud it
• Your users might need more training than you think

Check out the full details (you know: the explanation of those little pithy points above) over on the RedMonk Spiceworks page, and leave a comment there telling us how you’re evaluating services and, more importantly, how you’re defining ongoing success with using cloud-based IT.

…and check out the previous commentary I did around Spiceworks’ findings about virtualization use.

Disclosure: Spiceworks is a client and this work was done as part of their RedMonk subscription.