Plenty of cloud-based storage and backup apps, such as Dropbox, offer completely free accounts that work well for personal use. Such accounts may also be appropriate for smaller businesses, but there’s more than one reason why you should strongly consider opting for a paid account.
Here are just four major advantages.
- Additional Space
For personal users and many small businesses, all that needs to be stored and backed up are a bunch of Word documents, and maybe a few larger files. In other words, it’s likely that the storage allocation of a free account is going to prove sufficient. However, all that changes for slightly larger businesses. You can run out of space quickly, and that can be a real pain if one of your team needs to upload an important file. Luckily enough, paid accounts offer vast and flexible storage.
- Superior Sharing
Most free accounts are designed to be used by only a single person, which is usually absolutely fine. However, business users are likely to require access from multiple devices, with several logged on at once, and you’ll often find that this sort of sharing is beyond the scope of a free account. To ensure synchronised collaboration, use a business account.
- Stronger Security Options
As business accounts are expected to be used by more than one person, they typically offer vastly improved security features. For example, you should be able to set expiration dates for any links that you share, meaning you can provide access to a file without that access being indefinite. You should also be able to monitor exactly which devices are accessing which files. In the unpleasant situation of a single device being lost or stolen, you can protect yourself from a data breach by having files remotely wiped.
- Priority Support
Finally, having a paid account puts you at the front of the line if problems ever occur. Cloud-based storage is inherently safe, but sometimes servers go down or other problems arise. Paid account holders will receive priority support, so you should be able to regain access to your files as quickly as possible in the unlikely situation of a problem occurring.
