How Public Cloud Services Providers Are Able To Keep Their Services Free

Many people have wondered how it is that providers of public cloud services are able to function even as their solutions are used without charge. This has led some of the public to mistrust these service providers as they are unsure as to how these companies are making their revenue. There is no guesswork here as the internet made it possible to structure alternative revenue streams capably if you know. Here is a quick look at how a cloud computing company that was offering free cloud services to the public would go about making money.

Freemium

Anyone who has been on the internet for a while is familiar with this business model. Here, a company provides a toned down, simplified, and yet powerful version of their product to a majority of the market for free. They allow people to test out their solutions and products on a free basis which in most cases is not time limited.

Out of all the people who have tried out the solution, a certain percent will proceed to seek an increase in the functionality that the solution provides. The service provider is then able to request them to subscribe to the cloud services to get access to premium functionality. This model ensures that the services provider ends up marketing their solution to people who have already tried it and liked it.

Beta testing

A cloud computing company is by its sheer nature an innovator. The relatively new field of cloud computing means every company that comes into this market segment will have to invest in research and development of cloud solutions. These solutions must then be tested under normal conditions to ensure that they will work once they are rolled out into the consumer markets. Public clouds have a wide number of people who are willing to try out new solutions. Public cloud platforms have been used to beta test the newest cloud solutions in the market. They charge the cloud developers for providing this immensely valuable service of crowd sourced beta testing.

Commercial services provision

Public cloud services tend to be a smaller operation compared to the enterprise segment of the computing market. Most companies who provide these services use them to create goodwill for the adoption of their commercial services. They are therefore able to make an investment in these solutions knowing that the return is coming from a different avenue.