Our world can now be divided into ‘before COVID’ and ‘after COVID,’ and that includes rethinking IT strategy.
The pandemic has spurred increased IT spending and organizations are allocating more money to move their operations to the cloud, with work-from-home (WFH) as the key driver.
Even way back in 2020 B.C. (that’s ‘Before COVID-19') the shift to the cloud was well underway. But, new research suggests the COVID-19 pandemic is accelerating that trend, big time.
Many found themselves unprepared when offices were ordered to close in March, in line with measures to contain the coronavirus outbreak. Existing IT infrastructures were put under unusual and unexpected stress as orders to stop-work went into place. Not all companies have managed the shift to a virtual office, or at least not smoothly. In fact, some companies have been unable to operate at all since they were locked out of the office without access to their physical servers. Now, if they want to survive they need to change the way they think and make some tough decisions.
Why Cloud?
In the simplest terms, cloud computing means storing and accessing data and programs over the Internet instead of your computer's hard drive. Fundamentally, we are currently running the biggest remote work experiment humankind has ever known and it’s speeding up the shift to cloud services. Now, and in the near future, we’re going to see many companies migrating from traditional data centers to hybrid or full cloud infrastructures.
Here’s why:
The cloud enables remote activities with faster deployment.
The cloud ensures availability.
The cloud helps cut the upkeep.
The cloud ensures easier back-up and recovery of data
This is where Salesforce comes into the picture...
How is Salesforce cloud rightly positioned and why you should be choosing Salesforce for your business?
Salesforce, the global leader in CRM (Customer Relationship Management), is a cloud computing Software as a Service (SaaS). It is on track to become nearly six times larger than Salesforce itself by 2024. TheStreet's founder Jim Cramer even dubs the service as a 'Cloud King' and has been very bullish on the stock - seemingly with good reason.
Through industry-specific extensions or business-aligned apps, the Salesforce Customer 360 platform helps accelerate the growth of the partner ecosystem, and most importantly, the growth of customers.
Salesforce offers a wide variety of CRM categories and systems to meet your needs, including Sales Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Service Cloud, Analytics Cloud, Data Cloud, Community Cloud, App Cloud, and IoT, serving more than 150,000 customers.
Since Salesforce is fully Cloud-Based, users can access its full functionality, without having to install costly in-house hardware or computer servers. No hardware means you’ll be up and running and positively impacting your business in no time.
Your team can use Salesforce from anywhere with access to the Internet. Salesforce is readily scalable to your company’s growth and it's affordable. Even small start-ups can afford Salesforce to build their applications.
The tech skills gap will become a major roadblock for economic growth in the future. To address this issue Salesforce has introduced Trailhead, an online learning platform, which means people don’t need to carry six figures in debt to land a top job; instead, anyone with an Internet connection can now have an equal pathway to landing a job in the Salesforce Economy.
In addition to Salesforce being a highly innovative company they've also made some amazing acquisitions like Tableau and Mulesoft, largely to build out the platform’s AI capabilities, known as the ‘Einstein’ brand.
All of this explains how investing in a cloud-based, scalable, customer-focused CRM will enable your organization to provide a satisfying experience to the people who keep you in business, and to do so on a personal level. Salesforce CRM gives you the power to provide an effective, custom experience for every one of your clients, whether you have a customer base numbering in the dozens, or the millions.
