By Acronis Guest Blog

Nowadays, technology vendors make it pretty easy to set up and offer a cloud backup service to end user customers. But, for most service providers, that is where the hard part begins: Why sell cloud backup? To start, the conversation should begin by discussing the importance of backup solutions to businesses today, the reasons that they back up, and how this provides opportunities for service providers to package up a differentiated cloud backup service offering.

Customers that turn to MSPs for data protection tend to face a variety of business challenges that drive them to consider cloud backup and recovery solutions.

The first challenge is cost. Cloud backup and recovery solutions are treated as operating expenses versus on-premises solutions, which are capital expenditures. In today’s economy, it is often easier to get approval for less expensive and more flexible OPEX models versus CAPEX spending.

Today’s infrastructure is also getting increasingly complex, especially for SMBs. This forces companies to offload IT responsibilities to service providers because they cannot afford to hire the core competency needed in-house. This complexity and related challenges are caused by:

If data is lost or stolen, the pain and cost associated with getting it back–as well as getting IT systems and applications back up and running in the event of larger disasters–can literally put companies out of business.

Trends and Opportunities Point to Explosive Growth for Cloud Backup

In a recent Spiceworks State of the IT Report, which surveyed over 1,100 IT professionals, the study found that 41 percent of those using cloud services are using it for backup and recovery. Furthermore, of the IT professionals using cloud services at organizations with less than 19 employees, 60 percent use cloud backup and recovery services.

Today, cloud technologies and improvements in connectivity can support faster, more secure backup and recovery, and many find that cloud storage is a way to further reduce IT costs. Businesses can now back up data directly to the cloud without worrying about data loss, eliminating the costs and resources associated with on-premises data protection solutions.

The combination of today’s leading cloud data protection solution with the strong support and technology expertise of today’s local service providers opens up the data protection opportunity to more companies than ever before.

Business Drivers for Cloud Backup

From a business perspective, business are now seeing the value in backing up data to the cloud. The following lists a sampling of the top reasons, per a recent Redmond Magazine Report, that businesses are making the move:

Now that you know why your customers need a backup solution, and all the great opportunities that are in front of you, exploit the growing revenue opportunity and tap into the market for cloud backup and data protection. You can learn more in this video from Acronis.

John Zanni is Chief Marketing Officer and Senior Vice President, Channel and Cloud Strategy, Acronis. Responsible for the strategy and growth of Acronis’ cloud and hosting business and Acronis global marketing, John previously was Service Providers Chief Marketing Officer at Parallels. He oversees the company’s global service provider marketing function, spanning the full service provider channel. Prior to joining Parallels, John was general manager of the Worldwide Software plus Services Industry team for the Communications Sector at Microsoft. In this role, he was responsible for driving the strategy for Microsoft’s hosted cloud business. He worked closely with all types of service providers, including Web hosts, SAAS ISVs and telcos, to ensure that they were provided with the tools and resources necessary to grow their business. Zanni was also responsible for helping drive Microsoft’s partner hosted initiative to provide the software-plus-services-based next-generation platform, business applications and a compelling digital lifestyle experience for end users through its extensive partner ecosystem.