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Cloud Computing Shifts the TCO Discussion

The cloud computing model can help companies conserve cash and focus limited resources on the business, instead of reacting to IT infrastructure-related fire drills. In the cloud computing model, vendors provide Web-based access to applications as a service, through a subscription pricing model. This eliminates the need for customers to buy, deploy and manage IT infrastructure and solutions. Vendors take responsibility for everything: the servers, storage, operating system, database, business software, updates, migration, power and cooling, data center space, and support services. As a result, cloud computing shifts the IT burden from the customer to the cloud computing application vendor.

Cloud computing vendors can provide these benefits because they’ve built their solutions as Web-based services from the ground up. Instead of building their solutions to run in-house, as a separate, individual instances for each customer, they architect their solutions for a one-to-many, or multi-tenant model. This means that they can run thousands of customers on a single instance of the database and application software. By optimising their business solutions for this shared environment, they can achieve efficiencies throughout the solution lifecycle that would be difficult for on-premise vendors to achieve.

Lean and mean IT

Headquartered in Slovakia, the U.S. division of this security software firm has grown from 1 to 135 employees over the past 10 years. The division had began by using multiple brands of packaged software for accounting, contact management and reporting functions. But as it grew, the organisation wanted tighter integration across functions, better reporting, and an easier way to provide access to an increasing number of remote employees. It also wanted to keep upfront capital and ongoing support costs low. “The fact that there was little or no infrastructure or internal support required drove us to a software-as-service solution,” according the firm’s Business Systems Director. Since deploying NetSuite in 2006, the company has kept IT “lean and mean”, and “the single system, real-time view of customers helps our sales and support teams to offer better service to customers”.

Why does TCO matter?

In the IT industry, Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) is used to calculate the total cost of purchasing (or in the case of cloud computing, subscribing to), and of operating a technology solution over its useful life. TCO provides a realistic and holistic measure of the long-term costs required to acquire and operate technology solutions. Return on investment (ROI) is another method to evaluate and prioritise technology investments in a company. This measure is typically used to compare investments that uncover new top line revenue and growth opportunities. However, ROI tends to be more subjective in nature than TCO, because ROI looks at business benefits, which often cannot be measured as objectively as costs.
Hurwitz & Associates views TCO as a preferred method to compare technology investments when two solutions provide roughly equivalent benefits over the solution lifecycle, but have different types of costs associated with acquisition, maintenance and operation. For these reasons, a TCO comparison offers a more tangible assessment of the total costs involved in deploying cloud-based SaaS and on-premise business solutions.

Link Building Methods – SEO

IAcquiring quality links can be difficult, but there are a variety of methods out there that can help you with link building that will improve your site’s search engine rankings.

Method 1 – Link Exchanges – One great method of link building is to use link exchanges. This is really not that difficult and it will provide some great links to your site. What you’ll need to do is contact people that have similar sites or blogs that revolve around the same topics. This is important because links on sites that are not relevant to your site are not going to help out your site at all. Make sure that you link to the sites you want to link back to you. Then you can send out emails letting people know that you have linked to their site and you are wondering if they would put in a link to your site as well. This can bring some quality results when you are trying to build up quality links.

Method 2 – Try Paid Reviews – Paid reviews is one of the best methods for link building, since it helps to you to acquire links that are permanent and embedded in anchor text. What you need to do is to find top quality reviewers that have blogs where they post reviews of other sites or blogs. Then you can pay someone to write a review of your site or you can write the review yourself and pay someone to put it up on their blog or site.

Method 3 – Submit to Directories – Submitting to directories is another option that you have when you are trying to build up links. Usually it doesn’t take a whole lot of time to submit your site to directories. Submitting to niche directories is an excellent idea that can provide quality links that are liked by the search engines. However, it is important to realize that not every directory is a quality one that you should be submitting to. If you are just getting started, this is a great option.

Method 4 – Article Marketing – Article marketing is one of the top methods of link building as well. This is a great way to get quality links to your site out there. However, it is important that you use quality articles to top directories. Of course if you do shoddy work, you can expect shoddy results when you use this method. If you are not a top quality writer, then hire a good writer to write your articles for you. When you submit these quality articles to directories, you need to make sure that they relate to your site in some way. Also, make sure that you write a quality resource box and include a text link to your site as well. This will ensure that you get the best possible results from this method of link building.

Method 5 – Social Networking Sites – Social networking sites can also provide you with some great links if you know how to use them. You can post quality information on sites such as YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, and Yahoo 360. These are popular sites that provide links that can help to build up your link popularity and help you increase the rankings of your site on the search engines, and also greatly increase your efforts to make money online.

These are just a few of the best methods for link building out there today. While the two way links can work, the one way links are the best ones, even though they are a bit tougher to get

Link Building Methods – SEO

IAcquiring quality links can be difficult, but there are a variety of methods out there that can help you with link building that will improve your site’s search engine rankings.

Method 1 – Link Exchanges – One great method of link building is to use link exchanges. This is really not that difficult and it will provide some great links to your site. What you’ll need to do is contact people that have similar sites or blogs that revolve around the same topics. This is important because links on sites that are not relevant to your site are not going to help out your site at all. Make sure that you link to the sites you want to link back to you. Then you can send out emails letting people know that you have linked to their site and you are wondering if they would put in a link to your site as well. This can bring some quality results when you are trying to build up quality links.

Method 2 – Try Paid Reviews – Paid reviews is one of the best methods for link building, since it helps to you to acquire links that are permanent and embedded in anchor text. What you need to do is to find top quality reviewers that have blogs where they post reviews of other sites or blogs. Then you can pay someone to write a review of your site or you can write the review yourself and pay someone to put it up on their blog or site.

Method 3 – Submit to Directories – Submitting to directories is another option that you have when you are trying to build up links. Usually it doesn’t take a whole lot of time to submit your site to directories. Submitting to niche directories is an excellent idea that can provide quality links that are liked by the search engines. However, it is important to realize that not every directory is a quality one that you should be submitting to. If you are just getting started, this is a great option.

Method 4 – Article Marketing – Article marketing is one of the top methods of link building as well. This is a great way to get quality links to your site out there. However, it is important that you use quality articles to top directories. Of course if you do shoddy work, you can expect shoddy results when you use this method. If you are not a top quality writer, then hire a good writer to write your articles for you. When you submit these quality articles to directories, you need to make sure that they relate to your site in some way. Also, make sure that you write a quality resource box and include a text link to your site as well. This will ensure that you get the best possible results from this method of link building.

Method 5 – Social Networking Sites – Social networking sites can also provide you with some great links if you know how to use them. You can post quality information on sites such as YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, and Yahoo 360. These are popular sites that provide links that can help to build up your link popularity and help you increase the rankings of your site on the search engines, and also greatly increase your efforts to make money online.

These are just a few of the best methods for link building out there today. While the two way links can work, the one way links are the best ones, even though they are a bit tougher to get