The cloud has become the backbone of modern business operations, from communication to finance. Its exponential growth has paved the way for countless innovations and its widespread adoption.

A year can be measured in 525,600 minutes, according to the song “Seasons of Love” from the hit musical Rent. But after more than a year since the global pandemic pushed employees out of the offices and into their homes, we ask the following questions.

The pandemic forced many businesses around the world to switch to remote work setups. And thanks to cloud computing technologies such as email, video conferencing applications, and cloud storage, it’s possible for employees to collaborate remotely with each other.

Many accounting and auditing firms are utilizing cloud computing to improve business efficiency and productivity. And through cloud-based accounting solutions, they are finding it easier to prepare and examine financial records.

While they are similar to traditional desktop accounting software, cloud-based tools are packed with these benefits:

#1. Flexibility
With desktop-based accounting programs, your software, data, and accounts are saved to a local drive, which means you can access these only on a particular computer.

Cloud computing is transforming the way companies store and access business-critical applications and data. Syncsort’s 2018 report showed that IT professionals consider business continuity to be the topmost benefit of the cloud. This is no surprise. With the cloud, applications and data are typically stored and accessed securely from a central, off-site location so that business can continue as usual despite unplanned interruptions or incidents.

Since its inception, cloud services has become an in-demand enterprise technology, especially for small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). According to a Gartner survey of 699 US-based SMBs in 2017, 62% are already using cloud computing, while 33% are planning to implement the technology.

The cloud is the best thing that ever happened to small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). That’s because technologies that were previously available only to large enterprises are now within their reach.

However, not all SMBs are willing to make the transition to the cloud, either because they think it’s expensive or less safe than on-premises systems.

If you’ve decided to move your business to the cloud, then you’ve already made the first step toward transforming your operations. Things don’t stop there, however – the next step is to decide who will host your data and systems, and how everything will be set up.