What You Should Ideally Consider When Choosing a Cloud Hosting Provider

Businesses are likely to cater to customers spread all across the world. There is a common misconception amongst us that a provider that is geographically closer to a specific market is perhaps the best cloud vendor for that business. But proximity to your target audience may not be the sole criterion to getting the best cloud hosting provider for your business. Cloud vendors make use of different technologies to cater to a global audience as they will have multiple POPs or Points of Presence throughout the globe. The traffic is rerouted all across the world and data from various data centers will be made available to customers to make sure they get the content they are looking for.

One of the important things to bear in mind when shifting to cloud server hosting is security. Meeting latest security norms and regulations will be challenging for any business because these are always changing. So, it is necessary to choose a cloud hosting provider that has a thorough knowhow of these latest security norms. For instance, your cloud vendor should be aware of SSAE compliance, the standard using which security is audited. The provider should also have proper provisions for updating these security measures.

Before you sign up with any cloud hosting provider, it may also be a good idea to check their track record. The cloud vendor should have an impeccable reputation of having kept client data safe from breaches. Regardless of the nature of business you may have, it is a well known fact that loss of client data is always damaging. Besides, the cloud vendor of your choice should also offer a private cloud infrastructure for additional security. This means that when you are on the lookout for a cloud hosting provider, you ought to search for a company which offers both public and private clouds. The private cloud will give you the same benefits that you can get from a public cloud, except that the resources are delivered only to a single client.

You must be able to trust your cloud hosting provider to carry out online financial payments through credit cards. Since penalties for failure to comply with HIPAA and PCI rules are very heavy these days, both in terms of monetary losses and loss of reputation, you should be very cautious when choosing a vendor. Your vendor must adopt stringent and robust security measures if it is processing credit card payments. Likewise, when your business is in the healthcare sector, you need a provider which is well-informed about compliance with HIPAA rules concerning patient data confidentiality.

Finally, when you are looking for the perfect cloud hosting provider for your business, you must select one which boasts of a qualified and experienced staff, well trained in handling security arrangements. The company should also be financially stable because you will not want to invest in a provider which may shut down its operations soon. You must make sure that the provider enjoys a solid financial background; you can consult press releases and look at financial reports of the company to be certain.