Buyer decision-making is different in a cloud-native company. Sellers need to understand how cloud-native companies work, so they can consider what changes their solutions drive.
This article will help you comprehend 4 key concepts about how buyers operate their organizations “in the cloud” in today’s world.
KEY 1: Cloud-native companies are born in the cloud.
Cloud-native companies are built using cloud technologies. That means the only physical hardware the company owns are devices (they don’t own a single server “on-premise.” As defined by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF), Cloud-native technologies empower organizations to build and run scalable applications in public, private, and hybrid clouds. Features such as containers, service meshes, microservices, immutable infrastructure, and declarative application programming interfaces (APIs) best illustrate this approach. These features enable loosely coupled IT systems that are resilient, manageable, and observable. They allow engineers to make high-impact changes frequently and with minimal effort.
KEY 2: Cloud Technology Practices
Cloud-Native companies use cloud technologies to:
- Design or redesign applications built to run in public, private, and hybrid cloud infrastructure.
- Architect applications from the ground up to run in a public cloud, like in AWS, Azure, or GCP, using cloud-based technologies.
- Create containers, service mesh, microservices, and serverless functions, which can be independently updated, controlled, scaled, or reconfigured to deliver a coordinated application experience. These techniques enable loosely coupled systems that are resilient, manageable, and observable. Combined with robust automation, they allow engineers to make high-impact changes frequently and predictably with minimal toil.
- Focus on speed and agility. Business systems are evolving from enabling business capabilities to weapons of strategic transformation that accelerate business velocity and growth. It’s imperative to get new ideas to market immediately. At the same time, business systems have become increasingly complex, with users demanding more. They expect rapid responsiveness, innovative features, and zero downtime. Performance problems, recurring errors, and the inability to move fast are no longer acceptable. Your users will visit your competitor.
- Embrace rapid change, large scale, and resilience. The adoption of cloud-native is driven by the speed, automation, efficiency, scalability, and portability advantages it can bring to the modern enterprise.
- Cloud-native applications are flexible and built to scale, and because of the microservice architecture, areas of an app can be upgraded without disruption.
- Continuously integrate orchestra update container engines. Ultimately, it’s about how applications are created and deployed.
- Explore supportive, complementary, and adjacent trends such as adopting multi-cloud infrastructures, Artificial Intelligence, IoT workloads, and edge computing.
In a Cloud-Native company, they operate close to 100% in the cloud from the beginning of its initial startup phase. On the other hand, many existing companies founded before 2015 have built “on-premise” infrastructures and operate in a hybrid cloud and on-premises environment.
KEY 3: Cloud Adoption
Cloud adoption by companies is expanding worldwide at an exponential rate. To remain competitive, there is a growing need to optimize the IT delivery process and support business goals that drive agility and innovation. Cloud implementation requires a clear-sighted analysis of your organization’s people, processes, and technology, including the challenges faced by each area. Such challenges include employees being stretched thin as the company portfolio grows (people), rigid or outdated approaches to application delivery (processes), and proprietary roadblocks as the organization scales (technology).
Cloud-native computing is the latest wave of digital disruption to overcome this migration challenge. Being digital-first means moving from surface-level efficiency plays to true transformation and rethinking the business using digital and cloud technologies. Both new entrants and incumbents are using digital to drive business advantage. They are redefining the rules, roles, and resources to become giants of disruption.
New entrants find it easier to be digital natives because they don’t have the migration challenges of incumbents.
These new entrants are Digital Native (sometimes called Cloud-Native). Digital native companies fit the following criteria:
- The company is scaling. Wants to use more scalable (horizontal scale, microservices) and externally managed data infrastructure.
- Already uses the technologies but wants better service and flexibility (pricing + technical)
- “Cloud Natives” came into existence in a cloud world
- High Growth: Ithe amount of data and the number of people
- Decision-making is agile and developer influenced
- Needs to focus resources while keeping control and visibility
- Born-in-the-cloud; Software / SaaS is fundamental to their products and services
- May have initially adopted toolsets ad-hoc based on Engineers’ preferences and experience. Hitting cost + complexity hurdles.
- Ready to be intentional about technology selection going forward
“Cloud Native technologies enable loosely coupled systems that are resilient, manageable, and observable. Combined with robust automation, they allow engineers to make high-impact changes frequently and predictably with minimal toil.”
KEY 4: Understand their Perspective
Given that you are a seller, you need to put yourself in the decision maker’s shoes and estimate what they value and what they are willing to sacrifice.
- They don’t care about technology and tools. They want something that is easy and works.
- Well-funded startups would increase their spending from 50->100k with the existing tool rather than change. provided they can spend their time on winning more business or delivering what is essential to “keep the lights on”
- if the technology is critical to their BAU, they won’t be changing
- if the incumbent is failing; they will change in a heartbeat