Modern businesses don’t just run on money, even though revenue generation is obviously key. Data is the new currency, and it almost doesn’t matter what your business actually is: data plays a central and vital role. Every email, every spreadsheet, every document is data that’s vital to the smooth functioning and growth of your business.
Which is why it’s rather surprising that so many businesses don’t really pay any attention to data backups. Backups are by their nature dull, but you’d be surprised by how much the adrenaline flows when you suffer a business continuity event that sees you scrambling for your most recent backup, if it exists at all. That’s data lost in some way, whether it’s a failed hard drive, lost laptop or ransomware encrypting your precious details out of reach.
It’s not just a question of lost time, but potentially the loss of data that could sink your business relationships, tarnish your image or in some cases leave you open to potential legal action. If you’ve got data anywhere that your business relies on, then backup shouldn’t be seen as a chore, but an absolute necessity. Here’s what you need to consider when choosing a backup solution:
- Local or cloud backup? Locally stored data is typically quicker to access in the event of an emergency, but for some events it won’t save you – an office fire could melt those backup discs, for example, and you’ve got to configure backup software to run at reliable intervals to ensure the least amount of downtime. Conversely, however, you’ve got to ensure that any cloud-based managed backup service has adequate security in place, and that you’re meeting any legal requirements relating to your specific business data when using cloud services.
- Self-managed or host managed? Taking a DIY approach can be more cost effective than using specialists to manage all your backup needs, but it’s also time at work that could be put towards other business central tasks. However, if it’s an employee (or yourself) doing the backup, you’re already paying for that time rather than incurring additional management costs. If you do opt for a managed backup solution, check for the existence of service level agreements so that you can be sure to be able to access backups at any time, or recreate systems to new hardware that may not match the original devices.
- Security levels: Most backup software and cloud services will offer some level of data encryption, which is vital in a business sense, but not all do. It’s also worth considering additional verification steps with multiple levels of authentication for your most sensitive data.
- Ongoing costs: There are free packages that will handle local backups, and for very small data stores you could even use the smaller free quotas that some online cloud repositories offer to keep your costs down. It’s very much a case of getting what you pay for, however, but it’s equally important to consider the ongoing subscription costs (and any data access/upload costs) for paid packages as well.
As always, if you need a little help configuring your business backups to keep you safe online, Geeks2U is here to help.
