These days, everyone massively produces and uses data. This includes contacts, apps, files, photos, content, digital infrastructure, websites and much more. If you were to lose all this data, it would bring your webshop and life to a sudden standstill. Backup software protects all your important data against loss, and therefore provides peace of mind and supports the continuity of your business. In this blog post we will explain what backup software is, how it works and why you should use it.

What is backup software?

Backup software is a technology that manages but also automates the backup process. You install it on your devices or on the network, configure it to run at pre-determined intervals, and most likely don’t think about it again. Until you need to actually restore your backup.

The backup software copies the data on your devices and forwards it to the cloud, where they are safely stored until whenever you want to access them.

Most people just assume that their SaaS (software-as-a-service) data is backed up by the platform. That’s partly true, but doesn’t mean your platform is also capable of recovering individual account data. Most SaaS companies -including Shopify- follow something called the Shared Responsibility Model, which means users are responsible for backing up and securing account-level data. Some examples of important account-level data that your platform cannot restore are: app settings, dependencies between third-party apps and integrations, customer account data, custom themes, code, financial files, and more.

So yes, if a meteorite would land on your platform’s servers, they would be capable of restoring all of the data on their platform. But if a more common disaster were to occur, such as a buggy app, an error, malware, or a mad employee, unfortunately your platform would not be able to recover that lost data.

Rewind Backups App

Why should you use it?

Backup software is a subscription-based software-as-a-service (SaaS), which makes it easy to get started. Once the software is installed on your system, it runs automatically in the background, meaning you don’t have to process your backups manually.

If you didn’t have backup software, you would have to do your backups manually. Depending on the amount of data to be backed up, this all adds up to variable costs such as external drives or servers, a data center and cloud storage. You will need to upgrade regularly, and on top of that you will also need to think about actually doing the backup, which can be a challenging thing if you can’t spare much time to do so.

There are companies that employ IT staff whose job it is to provide backups, but that is a large expense that not all companies can afford. In contrast, backup software is affordable and lowers the cost of your data protection. Moreover, it is easy to manage for just about anyone, whether you have a lot of IT knowledge or not.

A few benefits

Here are just some of the benefits you will enjoy by using backup software:

1. Safe Data

Your data is encrypted and securely stored in the cloud, where the latest data security solutions are used. Backup software from a trusted company is the most reliable and secure way to ensure data availability and integrity.

2. Scheduled Backups

Set up your backups to run continuously, daily, weekly or at an interval that makes sense for both you and your organization. A set schedule makes disaster recovery possible, because if data needs to be restored, you can do so from a specific point in time.

3. Automated Backup Process

Once you have configured your backup software, the process is completely automated. The automation allows both you and your employees to focus on the higher-value tasks, such as building your business.

But how does it work?

Today’s backup software (also known as backup-as-a-service or BaaS) is affordable, easy to use, and very secure. Once it’s installed on your systems, you choose settings and set preferences depending on how you want your backups to run.

Backup software can be configured to run automatically or manually. Some companies prefer to run automatic backups because it allows them to take care of other things. Other organizations or individuals then prefer to back up manually. It all depends on how hands-on or hands-off you want to be.

The best backup software gives you the option of doing full backups or incremental backups. With a full backup, all data is copied to the backup drive. Incremental backups only copy files that have changed since the last full backup. The advantage of incremental backups is that you save storage space, which can also save you money.

If your backup service is cloud-based, your data is copied, encrypted, and then sent to the cloud over the Internet. There they are stored in a public or private cloud. This data is encrypted both in transit and at rest to prevent unauthorized access.

You can also configure the software to create a backup on a local drive, in which case your data will remain accessible to you regardless of whether you have an Internet connection or not. With local backups, the problem is that if you lose your business premises in, say, a fire, flood, or any other event, you have actually lost your backup. That’s why most companies employ a 3-2-1 backup strategy, where 3 copies of the data are made on 2 different media, one of which is stored off-site or in the cloud. Ideally, you want to create redundancy, and the best backup software supports that.

What software should you use?

Choosing a backup solution is not obvious – after all, there are so many vendors, but how do you choose?

Prepare a list of your priorities.

Do you prefer manual or automated back ups? Do you need constant full backups? Or only incremental ones? How much data do you need to duplicate? And these are just a few examples you should consider.

The best backup software for you will be one that specializes in your industry niche. If you run an e-commerce store, you have different needs than a company that handles most of its business in person. Accounting firms, marketing agencies and web developers who handle large files and need precise restore points need software that meets those needs.

What do we think at Radikal?

Your data is your lifeline, so why take risks? Backup software is like an insurance policy for data: you never want to need it, but if you do, you’ll be glad you have it. We think it is important for our customers to have peace of mind and not have to worry about losing their data.

As a backup software app, we strongly believe in Rewind, who is our certified backup partner. Rewind is used by 100,000 organizations worldwide, and offers industry-specific backup software for Shopify. In our opinion, it is a very user-friendly app, which you can easily and quickly manage if you are not familiar with everything that has to do with backups. We invite you to take a look at the Rewind website to further convince you of making backups, because it might save you a lot of time one day.

Would you like more information on installing backups or are you interested in using Rewind on your webshop? Don’t hesitate to contact us. We are happy to help!

If you wan’t to try Rewind yourself: Start your backup trial here

Previously published on the Rewind blog