Why Website Backups Are Critical To Your Company

By Author: Wildfire Marketing Group Content Distribution Team
Total Articles: 49
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Something most web site owners have little time for is...anything! Anything other than focusing on their website content and the business or service it supports and the information it provides, that is. That means that administration is often lacking, as it frequently must - after all, there's only so much time in your day.

But the one factor that you should never let slide are backups. They are like insurance. You rarely need it (you hope), but when you do, you need it very badly.

Performing regular backups - and testing them - doesn't have to be a lot of work. With a little bit of forethought and effort and they can be automated to a high degree. And, they should be tested from time to time. Even when a backup appears to have gone flawlessly, the only way to know whether it's of any value is to attempt to restore the data. If it can't be restored, the backup is useless.

Even if the web hosting company provides the service, there still will be some planning involved for you. Hosting companies often rely on one or both of two methods; they backup all of yourfiles (called a full backup), or backup anything ...
... which has been modified since the last full backup (called an incremental backup).

Of critical importance are any configuration files that have been tailored. For example, if you've changed the standard installation of a software package, you want to be able to recapture or recreate those changes without starting over. Network configuration files, modifications to PHP files, CSS style sheets, Java Script files and others fall into the same category.

If you have XML files, databases, spreadsheets or any other files that carry product, subscriber information or order history, for example, they should get special attention. They are the lifeblood of your business. Lose them and you have to start from scratch. That can have a dramatic negative effect on your site that can last quite a while.

It should go without saying that all PHP and related web site files that comprise visible pages should be backed up regularly. It isn't necessary to back up every trivial modification, fortunately you can customize backup software to exclude specific files or folders. Usually they're so small that it isn't worth the effort, but in some scenarios it can add up when there are many thousands of files.

Here again, the backups are useless if they can't be used. Even if the hosting company charges for doing so, it's important to test at least a few times a year to make sure the data can be restored. That's especially true of database backups, which often involve special software and routines. Database files have a special structure and the information is related in certain ways that require backups be done differently.

Developing a backup plan can be straightforward. Start simply and review your plan from time to time, adjusting it as your site evolves and grows. The day will come when a hard drive fails, you get hacked, attacked by a virus, or you accidentally delete something critical. When that day comes, the time you invested developing and executing a backup plan will save you days or weeks of effort and more importantly, save you from lost revenue.
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