IT Managers, Chief Operating Officers, and CIOs are investing heavily in cloud-based hosted IT services that are cost-effective and seamlessly integrate with emerging business models. “Can you write me a check for X-$1,000s for new Exchange server(s)?” is an easier sell. or on the other hand “We can update and relocate to Facilitated Trade while never purchasing another server, and save X-$1,000s!”

Microsoft Exchange is used by nearly every business in the world. The majority of Outlook users do not even want to hear about anything novel or cool. It makes sense that switching to a new platform is often out of the question. Your in-house Exchange server can be moved to a cloud provider’s Hosted Exchange Service much more easily than you might think. I’ve done it, and I’m amazed at how simple it can be. When compared to in-house upgrades, migration tasks and time can be reduced by 75% or more.

Before dirt was invented, I, like many of my peers, used Microsoft Exchange. Do you recall Microsoft Mail? Exchange can be just as problematic as it was in the past. Here are four helpful tips to get you started on your plans to migrate from Exchange Server before switching to Hosted Microsoft Exchange.

Tip #1 – Trade Data set Upkeep, Your Closest companion

A Microsoft Trade Mailstore(s) is a data set. Mailboxes and the entire store can become corrupted and fragmented with little or no regular maintenance. Your Exchange mailstore database should be enabled for automated maintenance at least once per week. When maintenance is finished, it runs in the background and sends a report to the default email address for the system administrator.

Tip No. 2: CC Exchange Email Now to Feel Better Later CCing all of your existing email to your new hosted accounts is another step you can take to make your transition to the cloud easier. Without interfering with mail flow, this simple step will reveal any DNS and mail delivery issues, such as MX Record errors. Before going live, all of your employees can practice logging in to their new hosted account and test the service, which is another cool aspect of this step.

Tip No. 3: Migrate Exchange to the Cloud for Less Fat Exchange mailbox housekeeping is just as bad as housekeeping file shares. Please raise your hand if you have employees who are required to keep track of every email that is sent, received, and deleted. Okay, bad data is hard to separate from trash. Your IT department and the administrators of Exchange probably do not have access to every employee’s email. I suggest mandating that employees delete irrelevant and unwanted email as part of a company-wide initiative. Did I hear somebody say consistence? Mailboxes and the Exchange mailstores can both benefit from having old email archived. The objective here is to speed up the migration by minimizing mailbox size as much as possible. Go into Exchange Manager and take baseline numbers that show the number of objects and file sizes before the cleaning, as well as periodic views as the cleaning progresses.

Tip No. 4: Using a free utility will avoid migration problems A complete off-site Exchange migration is a wholesale switch to Hosted Exchange. It is not uncommon for your mailboxes to have corruption issues; Before you leave the house, you must resolve the issues. Bad data cannot be fixed by itself. Exchange mailboxes can sometimes be exported to individual PST files. At this point, run the PST files through a helpful, free tool called SCANPST.EXE. If Outlook is installed on the local Windows PC, this useful tool is there. Permit it to examine the sent out PST. I promise that your migration will go more smoothly!

These are just four useful hints that you can incorporate into your plans for migrating to Hosted Exchange. Although there are some similarities, not all migrations to hosted Exchange are the same. The most crucial thing to keep in mind is that mailboxes and mailstores in Exchange are databases that only support storage. When something goes wrong, it’s difficult to clean up and fix them. Before the big push, the process will move at a faster pace the cleaner and leaner your data is. Gracious no doubt, less stomach settling agents are required. Have fun!