The answer? Probably. Here, Sarah Doherty, product marketing manager at iland highlights why.

The average cost of downtime has been estimated at £193K per hour, so every minute counts if your systems are down or your data has been compromised. 

Data loss and security breaches are becoming increasingly common events in today’s world. It is not a matter of if, but when a disaster of any kind will happen.

All of an organisation’s information must be protected and readily available at all times in order for a business to survive. 

Considering this fact, the importance of backups cannot be overestimated and backing up vital data is an integral part of any business’s IT strategy. 

Ensuring effective off-site backup solutions is essential to any business, whether large or small. If an organisation’s backups are not well-managed, comprehensive disaster recovery becomes difficult, if not impossible. Business interruptions happen. It’s how you respond that is important to your bottom line. 

All organisations are starting to realise that IT innovation is a top priority while also understanding that they need to be agile enough to quickly pivot and keep running when disruptions occur.

Whether you are concerned about compliance or industry specific data protection regulations, you need to mitigate the risk associated with lost or corrupted data and that data needs to be ready to be restored at a moment’s notice. 

So firstly, what is backup?

Backup is the process of making an extra copy (or multiple copies) of data. You backup data to protect it.

You might need to restore backup data if you encounter an accidental deletion, database corruption, or problem with a software upgrade.

It is important to have a backup solution in place. Backup protects your data in case of theft (a single laptop to office break-ins), employee accidents (deletion of an important file), or a technical issue (crashed hard drive). With this protection, you can access a copy of your data and restore it easily. 

We all know that offsite data backup is something we should be doing. But, it’s not something that we all do.

Cloud backup services are an insurance policy to protect your data from any number of data loss threats.

It gives you peace of mind. Consider the following data loss situations. They are all too common and could send your business down the drain if an offsite backup solution is not in place. 

• Deleting files: Updating files or deleting them are common activities. 
• Viruses and malware: New viruses attack computers every day. 
• Mechanical damages: IT hardware/software is a fragile part of business networks. 
• Power failures: Power failures affect operation systems and hardware. 
• Computer theft: It’s a tragedy to lose both your computer and data at the same time – especially with more remote workers than ever. 
• Natural disasters: These continue to occur on a daily basis. 

In all these cases, another factor to consider is the cost of data recovery. The cost of professional recovery can be considerably more than maintaining an offsite backup. The best data recovery case is one that uses a reliable, offsite backup solution. 

Specifically, a secure cloud backup provider can help with the following: 

• Provide secure cloud storage for retaining up-to-date offsite copies of your virtual and physical server backups with easy restoration to your primary site. 
• Assist with optional integrated ‘air-gapped seven-day retention of backup data providing additional protection against ransomware and other threats. 
• Deliver data from recovery-aware backups. 

 In addition to receiving these services, using cloud backup solutions provides the following benefits to your business: 

• Decreased costs for disaster recovery testing and programs.
• Replaces capex with predictable usage costs.
• Offsite IT team available 24/7 in case of disaster or management questions.
• Less burden for your in-house IT staff.
• Reduced RTOs/RPOs to meet ever-changing business needs.
• Focused expertise gained by engaging offsite management.

Keep your business up and running all day, every day. Organisations shouldn’t wait for disaster to happen; they should take a proactive stance in leveraging cloud backup solution providers extensive IT backup and recovery experience, backed by proven methodologies with a range of recovery capabilities. 

For most organisations, backup strategies are absolutely critical to maintaining the future of the business. Organisations must address IT recovery by creating a comprehensive solution that encompasses people, process and technology.