What is Cloud?
Cloud computing is the storage of data in external servers. These servers are separate from your business network and can be accessed from anywhere with an internet connection, as long as you know the right passwords and details. Cloud services behave as though you could carry your internal business network around with you and it allows simultaneous access from all sides of the world.
How Cloud Can Improve Customer Communication
Customer communication usually takes two forms. It will either be in the form of questions and answers, or it will be a progressive and ongoing conversation about how to move forward with a project, service or system. With the question and answer type service, simply answering the phone promptly and being prepared with your information is the best way to address customers, but with ongoing discussions cloud computing offers a wonderful and unique system.
Previous communications about ongoing projects used to occur in the form of emails and attachments of documents between the client and the service provider. Cloud computing, however takes this one step further and allows two or more parties to edit the same document at once, creating an amalgamated document that has had input from all interested parties. This ongoing point of conversation allows for designs, projects and more to adapt quickly in order to recognise needs and desires. Managing these documents is very simple and keeping track of them allows for the system to constantly update procedures and practices.
Another benefit of cloud for communication is the simple sharing of documents within a folder. By creating an IT infrastructure such as this, it is very easy to keep track of all communications between parties in one place without the need to continually archive emails and collate information. A client could, for example, have in their folder a living document that detailed ongoing projects, an archive of past documents and a collection of invoices. All of these files would be shared with the customer and the folder would then act as a single go to point for customer and provider alike to access information of all kinds about the relationship. Whilst this may seem simple on the surface, the actual implementation of this system is hugely beneficial to both parties and creates a faultless and time-stamped record of communications and developments.