MSPs’ Tips for Helping Customers Control, Manage Cloud Spending

There are a variety of ways to help end users control and make the most of their cloud spending.

First, any chance of ongoing success requires dedication to financial discipline. The FinOps Foundation has emerged as a leader in promoting this train of thought. From there, show customers how to take advantage of cloud providers’ internal management tools. Some MSPs, including Mission Cloud, also provision proprietary management platforms. On top of that, dozens of vendors offer cloud cost and optimization software and/or consulting services. Usually a combination of people and platforms leads to the best results.

Here are some specific pointers from Unisys, Mission Cloud, Lemongrass and ClearScale, for increasing efficiency:

•        Understanding usage patterns to improve service scheduling or autoscaling.

•        Tagging resources.

•        Making sure storage is being used most optimally.

•        Managing contracts with attention to areas including discounts, reserved instances, savings plans and funding directly from the hyperscalers.

•        Automating processes to eliminate manual intervention and improve costs.

•        Tracking providers’ new services releases, which can replace existing applications, delivering more features for less money.

•        Making cost optimization a continual process, not a one-time event.

•        Monitoring bills for unexpected expenses.