Everyone is running fast and often it’s the person yelling the loudest, or the day’s most pressing issue, that gets the attention and the resources. However, if you don’t plan for data loss what will you do when that suddenly becomes the most pressing issue of the day? When we talk about this with customers and partners everyone always nods their heads, as in, “Of course people know it’s important to back up data and have a disaster recovery plan.” Well, it’s not as obvious as we may think.
Many small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) still need basic information about how and why to back up their data. Wow.
Need proof? Consider this telling example: New survey results from a Cloud storage provider showed that prior to using an online backup service, 23 percent of those polled claimed they never did backups at all. What’s more, a whopping 77 percent did not store backups in a secure offsite location! Those businesses would have been in serious trouble in the event of a disaster.
The survey, conducted by Riverdale Partners, included over 1,000 online storage customers from North America, Europe and Asia. Survey respondents represented a diverse range of industries and highlighted a range of Cloud storage benefits for SMBs concerned about digital business assets. Here are a two more survey highlights that I found intriguing:
- 57 percent of respondents have had a data issue or loss and been able to use the online storage service to recover their data.
- 64 percent of respondents said that the online service reduces their worries and lets them focus on their business.
Based on these survey results, it’s clear that while SMBs are beginning to recognize that backup and recovery services are essential components of any successful business plan, many still need information, first – so that they can choose the backup and recovery solutions that best suit their unique needs for security, reliability, collaboration and ease-of-use. Fortunately, the i365 Blog has a lot of sound advice for SMBs, who want learn more about online data protection, Cloud backup best practices, preparing for disaster, protecting both systems and data and extending on-site backup offsite.
