Sometimes running a small business can be a total juggle. Small business owners will generally start with just a handful of customers and when this is the case, dumping files and reports onto your desktop is going to be fine. However, when your business starts to really ramp up you may need to find a file storage system so you can manage to deliver your services with ease and efficiency. There are a whole bunch of online storage systems to save you from pulling your hair out, and to make it easier for you to decide, we’ve sampled a couple of the best options below.
Dropbox
Dropbox is a favourite among many small business owners. It’s simple to use and easy to set up. Plus you don’t have to jump on the Dropbox website to access your files as you can easily set up a file syncing system across multiple devices. If you are on the run and need to find or send a file to a customer, there’s a simple mobile app that allows you to send a link in a snap. One big downfall of Dropbox, however, is the 2GB of storage on the free account. Of course for a cost, you can beef this up to a larger storage capacity.
Google Drive
For small businesses that are already using Google for email services, Google Drive is a great option to find and file all your paperwork, documents and presentations. Google Drive extends beyond the simple storage and includes a bunch of other productivity tools like spreadsheet, word processing and presentation tools. One big seller for Google drive is you have up to 15GB of storage for free.
Amazon Cloud Drive
Amazon already sells you nearly anything under the sun and it wants to be the place where you store all of your music, photos, videos and any other files. Amazon Cloud Drive has been around for a while, one specifically for photos and one for all other files. Neither platform is free but both have free three-month trials to get a feel for it. Plus, you get unlimited storage for your photos and 5GB for files.
Box
Anyone can sign up for this cloud storage platform but the services are really geared towards larger businesses with more IT and security requirements. Box lets you share files with colleagues, assign tasks, leave comments on someone's work, and get notifications when a file changes. Another amazing advantage is that Box easily syncs with Salesforce and NetSuite so you can easily save documents to Box without leaving those platforms.
The big benefit of using an online storage system is that you can view your files from your mobile phone, tablet or computer, as long as you are connected to the Internet. This means it also works as a backup for files so they'll never disappear if your phone gets lost or your computer crashes. Using the cloud is a no-brainer, but picking the perfect service is down to your budget and requirements.