Making backup is vital!

For small business people value of their business is often stored on their computers.

Emails, contracts, PowerPoint presentations, business contacts, text documents and client databases are all vital information.

Accidents do happen and data can be lost! Are you sure you can restore your data back to what it was? Can you be back in business without losing to much time?

To be on safe side you should adopt a working backup strategy! Let's look at what can happen!

There are three different cases to consider.

1. Specific files or folders have been corrupted or deleted by accident.

2. The data on your hard disk have been lost. This can be caused by a virus or by hard disk failure.

3. Your computer have been lost. This can be caused by a natural disaster, a fire or by theft.

Your preparation and action should to be different in each different case.

It will also depend on how valuable data are for you and how much you are willing to spend on protection.

Here are your action plans for each case.

1. These are files which you are working with on a daily basis. It is vital data to your business and you should make backup of these files on a regular basis.

You should therefore identify them in advance. It can be files in folders like MyDocument, your emails or database files where you store your business information.

To do this you need to find a backup product from which you can easily make backup of these vital files on a regular basis.

Store backup you make in a safe place.

For extra security you can backup files online to a web server or you can hire space from companies that offer online backup services. If you use this option you should encrypt your data.

2. When you have a hard disk data loss you have to format disk, maybe with help from a person with experience.

The work involved reconfiguring computer by installing Windows can be extensive.

First after that Windows and backup program have been installed are you able to restore data from your backup.

To avoid this extra work you may consider making a full backup of your hard disk image. From an image backup you are able to restore directly your complete data back to your hard disk and avoid extra installation work.

3. You have lost your computer. But, because you already have backup of your vital data which you are working with on a daily basis, you are able to restore your business to any configuration on a new computer.