Regardless of the size of your business or what industry you're in, one critically important thing is the necessity of backing up your data consistently. Regular backups are easy to do with the right data backup method, and a managed service provider can currently implement and install regular updates for it. Despite the benefits, more than one-third of businesses don't have a data backup and recovery plan in place.

Reasons vary, but one thing is certainly clear; of the businesses that suffer a major data loss without data backups in place, more than half are often unable to recover, or result in a shutdown within 3-6 months.

An unexpected data loss can occur for a variety of reasons, including:

  • Natural disasters such as a fire or flood
  • Data breaches by hackers
  • Hard drive failures
  • Human error

In fact, human error accounts for more data loss than hackers or hardware failures. That's why it is critically important that every business have an effective data backup plan in place.

What Is a Good Data Backup Plan?

As mentioned above, most data backups can be fully automated, meaning the data will back up on a schedule you set without you having to worry about it. As a general rule, most businesses perform an automated backup at the end of each business day or overnight, ensuring every new bit of data is safely stored.

Additionally, it makes sense to have an offsite data backup system, such as a cloud backup service. This way, if a natural disaster were to destroy the systems in your organization, you can rest assured that your data is still safely stored in another location.

Lastly, you want a data backup system that offers good security. For data backups to be secure, they need to be encrypted and password-protected so that unauthorized employees, or cybercriminals cannot access the data.

Ways to Perform Data Backups

Cloud-Based Backups

Cloud-based data backup has become the most popular form of data backup because it's cost-effective, straightforward, and provides an offsite location to keep data safe.

Hardware Backups

A simple backup solution that transfers the data from computer hard drives to a location on the company network. It's not a bad solution, but there is the risk of a network failure, or data loss from a natural disaster.

Hybrid Backups

This is a combination of hardware backups and cloud-based backup services. It can sometimes be an ideal solution for businesses that wish too easily, and quickly restore some of the data each day or if the main system was compromised.

Benefits of a Managed Service Provider for Data Backup Services

Many businesses don't have their own IT department, and they don’t always have someone with sufficient knowledge to properly set up a reliable data backup and recovery system. That's why many businesses opt for a managed service provider. An MSP that offers backup services is a good partner to have since you can rest assured that your data will be safe, secure, and recoverable in the event of a disaster, or data loss. 

For any questions on what to expect from an MSP, contact JNT Tek today!