How to Visualize and Manage Your AWS Cloud Costs?
Technology has drastically changed the world of business over the last few years.
While advancements in technology have opened the door for all kinds of creative innovations, and even created completely new fields of business, it has also brought with them a certain amount of challenges.
A challenge that many companies face is the disparity between technically savvy employees and those who are not. This doesn’t necessarily mean employees who can run the scanner and printer wireless, or install a drive, but rather employees that are well versed in software development, SQL, data engineering, or data science.
For a lot of companies, it takes both technical and non-technical employees to make the dream happen.
So, finding tools that make complicated, technical information available to all the employees is paramount to success. One such tool that can be very effective at providing all employees, both technical and non-technical, with valuable information is an AWS cost explorer. Amazon already has a built-in AWS cost explorer that is free to use for any AWS clients, however, this can sometimes create more trouble than good. Due to the highly technical nature of these reports, they can be limited in the scope of effectiveness across a company or department.
Thankfully, there are other options, however. If you have been looking for ways to visualize and manage your AWS Cloud costs, here is everything you need to know!
What Exactly is an AWS Cloud Costs?
AWS stands for Amazone Web Service and is one of the largest cloud-based platforms in the world. With thousands of developers creating innumerable applications and services, Amazon offers one of the most competitive and comprehensive cloud services on the market. One of the reasons that Amazon’s corner on the internet through AWS is so popular, is that it has over 200 fully realized features. Not only does it offer core series like data storage and computing power, but it is competently a part of new technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning.
Who Uses AWS?
AWS is one of the largest cloud-based platforms on the planet and is used by a variety of different clients. Everything from the fastest growing startups utilizes this platform all the way to enterprise-sized companies and even governmental agencies. One of the main reasons that it is used by such a diverse group of clients is because it offers something for all sizes of business.
One way that AWS is able to do this and reach such a wide variety of clients, it’s because of its billing structure.
How Much Does AWS Cost?
When it comes to the cost of AWS, it sets itself apart from tier-based billing models by embracing a pay-as-you-use model. This is similar to how electric or water companies bill for utilities. There are no monthly fees, or contracts with limits, instead, all a company will pay for is the actual amount of AWS that they are utilizing.
This makes AWS an attractive option for smaller businesses or startups that might naturally not have the size or pull to conjure up a massive bill. However, because you get the same quality service and access to AWS and its 200 features regardless of whether you are a small start-up or an enterprise, you can utilize this to your advantage.
Forecasting Your AWS Bill
Just like when paying for utilities, there is a way to budget your resources for an expected cost when it comes to AWS. This is actually a very important thing for companies to keep their eye on. While they may budget for a certain amount, there is a certain level of responsibility that falls on the company to ensure that they stay within their budget.
The truth is that the world of technology and industry, in general, can be unpredictable. Things can go wrong, or you could experience some kind of unexpected situation that can cause your bill to range higher than you had budgeted. This is where having access to clean, organized, and easy-to-understand AWS forecasting can help you and your team.
By being able to create easy-to-navigate and digestible, daily usage reports, a company can always stay on top of their AWS costs. How this specifically helps any size company, is that it takes hard to understand technical reports and makes it so that all employees can understand them.
This means that department heads can giant faster insights into the areas of an AWS cost report that affect their department. Not only that, but with in-depth analysis, you can not only spot problems but create solutions with the same kind of ease.
Conclusion
The world of technology and web services is complex, to say the least; having an accurate, in-depth analysis of your AWS costs to help prevent unnecessary spending should not be. CloudForecast makes AWS cost analysis something accessible to everyone in a department, which can help to cut down on unnecessary and preventable spending.
