SMBs Are Afraid To Make The Leap To Cloud

By Christine Kern, contributing writer

Survey shows SMBS need more curation and support to transition to cloud services.

End-user spending on public cloud services is forecast to reach more than $26 billion by 2020, providing a huge opportunity for service providers and resellers to help businesses transition to the cloud. While a majority (61 percent) of U.S. SMBs report they are interested and eager to adopt more cloud services, nearly three-quarters (73 percent) are overwhelmed by the process and need help transitioning according to data released by AppDirect.

The report, based on a survey of IT decision makers from small to medium companies in the U.S., found SMBs use an average of 6.48 cloud services. As noted, three-quarters need guidance to finalize purchases and adoption while 85 percent want to talk to a real person who can answer their cloud-services questions.

Eighty-four percent of SMBs want a greater variety of cloud services options; 69 percent are looking for industry-specific apps; and 39 percent are concerned about data security in the cloud. In addition, spending is on the rise with 62 percent of SMBs anticipating increases in cloud services budgets in the next year.

“While the cloud promises to even the playing field for small businesses, it's clear that we still have work to do to ensure those businesses are getting access to the right cloud services, as well as getting the technical support and ability to manage it all from one place,” says Daniel Saks, President and Co-CEO of AppDirect. “The increase in the sheer number and types of cloud services has created a multi-billion-dollar opportunity for service providers and other resellers to become one-stop shops for small businesses around the world. By working together in one ecosystem, cloud service developers and resellers can help businesses find, buy and manage the cloud services they need.”