Selling the Cloud Sublime - To the Cloud: Big Data in a Turbulent World - page 93

insight into the ongoing process of constructing the cloud in discourse,
including protecting the image of the cloud from critical accounts that
might damage the industry. For example, Cloud Computing Journal offers
an article on how to “Avoid Failure When Marketing Cloud Computing.”
The piece irst declares just how essential it is to learn how to market
the cloud: “Research organizations are predicting that 'the cloud' will
dominate every facet of the software industry; no matter how concerned
customers are with security, access, and customization, the Software as a
Service (SaaS) market is guaranteed to grow” (Wilson 2012). The appeal
to research delivers a measure of legitimacy for what follows and the admis-
sion of problems is important because it provides what the literary scholar
Roland Barthes (1979) referred to as an inoculation that is important, if
not essential, for maintaining the mythic status of an object. In this case,
the admission of the security, access, and customization problems with
the cloud inoculates the myth of the perfect cloud with the recognition of
problems, which in most cases strengthens the argument for its essential
importance. The gentle nod of recognition gives greater weight to the
primary point that the cloud will dominate the software industry and that
its markets will grow. So get onboard. But how?
When it comes to speciics, one can see how this form of communica-
tion departs from the pure promotion of a commercial advertisement.
Maintaining that the cloud gives customers more power, cloud marketers
are advised to stay ahead of the process by assuming that any prospective
customer has done the necessary research prior to the personal sales pitch.
It is essential for cloud companies to develop the online presence that
makes it easiest for potential customers to determine what's right with their
cloud services before companies and customers talk. This includes white
papers, blog posts, and demo videos. In fact, the piece recommends that
cloud providers avoid spending more than a minimal marketing budget
on ofline advertising such as print ads, direct mailing, or presence at
trade shows. In addition to communicating online, cloud companies need
to use their websites to launch free software trials for customers because
customers want to know how software works (Wilson 2012). Another
site, Business Solutions , offers tips on how to sell cloud computing to busi-
ness. It advises that irst, if the customer appears to be environmentally
conscious, a provider should sell the cloud as a green technology that
will cut the corporate electricity bill. Second, for a company worrying