Why Backups Matter, And How To Do It Correctly.
Pretty much every business relies on the information stored on a hard disk somewhere to run their business efficiently and effectively. From customer information like phone numbers, email, addresses, to vendor data, to your own marketing and operations details, it all adds up to a huge asset for your business.
I’m always surprised when I run across business owners who either don’t back up their data at all, or are under the misguided impression that using a sync service like Microsoft OneDrive or Google Drive is an adequate backup method. Spoiler Alert: It’s totally not.
Let’s look at a few reasons why backups matter, and how to set it up in a safe, effective manner.
Why Offline Backups Matter, and Why Sync Services Are Probably Not Good Enough
Most business owners understand that having their data backed up is a good hedge against a ransomware event, and that is absolutely true. As long as the company has a backup and a good plan, the IT team can normally restore all the information on their systems in a matter of hours. What is often missed when thinking about the value of backups is that cyberattacks are not the most common cause of data loss. Companies are much more likely to lose data due to either a hard drive failure or an employee’s (intentional or unintentional) deletion of data. Regardless of the cause, data loss can be crippling if the company does not have the ability to restore things quickly.
Data sync services like Microsoft OneDrive or Google Drive are essential tools, but they have their limitations when thinking about a safe and effective backup solution. The first issue is that these services cannot make a full copy of each computer’s hard drive like a true backup system. Instead, they only backup data files, which means the IT team is going to have to completely rebuild the hard drive from scratch, including the operating system, software, account settings, and then, finally, the data. It can be done, but it takes time. The second issue is that, in the case of a ransomware cyberattack, quite often, the company is not only locked out of their computers but also the sync service, which means that you may not be able to get your computers back online at all unless you pay the ransomware and the hackers honor their end of the deal.
Steps to an Effective Backup Solution
Creating an effective backup solution isn’t rocket science. There are plenty of tools available to help you put together a solution that makes sense for your business.
Here are the top considerations if you are doing this on your own:
- Cloud-Based and/or Local Backup: Cloud-based backup solutions are great because they are secure, reliable, and relatively affordable. One challenge for a cloud-based system though is the time it can take to dowload all that data off a cloud system so that it can be re-installed. For this reason, many companies choose to create a local backup in the office on a physical hard drive, which makes recovery much faster, but can fail in the event of something like a flood or fire. Both systems have their strengths and weaknesses, which is why many companies choose to do both.
- Make A Plan: Writing up a recovery plan in advance is super important. Everyone is usually stressed when the company’s entire IT infrastructure has failed, and having thought through the recovery steps in advance can save you a bunch of time.
- Hold Practice Drills: It’s a good idea to practice recovering a hard drive backup and restoring it to a (test) computer from time to time, just to be sure everything works like it should.
Which Backup Solution Should I Use?
We have used the backup solutions from Acronis, iDrive, Macrium, and Synology, and would recommend any one of these as a solution worth investigating. As I said earlier, you may want to consider using a combination of these products if you need a solution that offers the best combination of speed and safety, although the costs obviously rise as you add more services.
There is no doubt that putting a backup solution in place will take time, but it is a vital component to building a business that is resilient to disasters like cyberattacks, fires, and floods. If you need help putting a backup solution together, feel free to schedule a free consultation with me and I’ll be happy to see what I can do to help.