I thought since it was close to New Year’s Eve and a great time to talk about resolutions, thought this little post would set a good reminder for you. What’s the reminder you say… back it up. Yes, back up your stuff from your computer!
I recently wrote a blog on having a plan B due to illnesses and natural disasters and let me tell you, if you have ever had a computer crash or lose a hard drive, trust me when I say… it will make you ill and feel like a national natural disaster! Be it as it may, I have had TWO such disasters, this year alone, so hear me when I say – BACK THAT STUFF UP!
I was lucky – do you want to chance it?
I had measures in place the first time, but wasn’t as ‘good as I could be’ with backing things up and paid a small penny to have stuff restored. I was lucky in that it was salvageable, but when I got all that stuff that was salvaged a month later, I had already done double my work to make up for it. The second time, I was totally prepared and lost NOTHING – well, two full work days and a humongous stress headache, and maybe a few tears.. oh and a big fat pity party. But, you know. So, my question to you is, do you want to chance it?
Why not get a computer backup in place now? Why would you want to risk it all? For real!? Click To TweetWhat do you currently have in place?
So, right now, if you were to lose your computer, in its entirety, what would happen with your business? Could you function? How long would you be ‘out of commission’? Consider these things. What if you didn’t lose your computer but had a virus or your hard drive crashed – what would you have lost, how long would it take for you to be back up and fully functional? These are things you need to consider and start putting things in place.
If your computer crashed or was lost/stolen – could your business function the next day or week? Click To TweetWhat you CAN do now
Not sure what you could do to prepare? Yea, well, I wasn’t completely sure at first, but I have many measures in place now that you will want to revisit your options. So, thought I would share what I do now, so you can see why you should take a look back and yours and make some revisions.
- Real time (or daily) back up – I use CrashPlan as a real time back up. There are others like Carbonite and etc so you have to do the research to determine what you need and how much space you’ll use as well as how often it backs up. This is offsite and would take a few days to totally restore, luckily I haven’t needed to use it and I have had it a year… but I have peace of mind. I can select whatever I want to have backed up, whenever I want and unlimited space.
- Computer back up – this is that one that is set up via your computer control panel. I have it going to an external hard drive. Obviously this is onsite so if my house were to flood, burn down or be swept away – it would be pointless, but it was a place that I could go to get something quick if I were to lose something. It is scheduled weekly.
- Cloud back up – I also have cloud storage for things that I use on a regular basis like client
information and etc that I can access from my phone and other computers. It is password protected and I personally back it up weekly. - Email back up – I don’t know if you use Outlook with those neat and organized folders, but that folder is backed up with the computer back up, but I also download a weekly .pst file just to be sure.
- List of restores – the first crash this year, I was tired of trying to remember what I needed so as I loaded software programs I had to reinstall – I made a list. I have a list of browsers, Microsoft Office key (keep those Windows discs handy too), monitors (3), printers (2), malware/virus programs, downloading instructions for certain programs and etc… to include the email account set up needed to reload everything back up after the restore.
Trust me, this has all made my restore a much easier process. It’s going to suck, let me tell you, but when your business is like 100% online and you depend on the internet or your computers for 100% of your business, you can relate to what I am saying.
Bottom line –
So if you don’t have any processes in place, or at least one onsite and one offsite process in place, you will HATE LIFE if it happens to you. So, please get your back up in place so your computer doesn’t CRASH your party. Oh and… you’re welcome!
Don't HATE Life by not having a computer back up, trust me - get 'er done! Click To TweetShould you have any questions about my internet business, my back up process or the like, contact me, I am happy to help. Let me know if the comments below… what do YOU have in place???
~Kristen
I never thought of making a list of programs that would need to be installed again if lost. That’s a great suggestions! I can just imagine how a person would feel if all the computer contents would be lost!! Horrible! Great advice!
Thanks Beth, I hadn’t either until I lost my stuff in one year.. but then again, I made the list as I was loading it back on my computer the first time. lol I learn quickly!
Wow! You are super organized. I need to fly you out to Virginia and have you work your magic. I do backup to a local hard drive. HOWEVER, even with a hubby in the IT profession, I have not been doing the other things you suggest in this article. The cloud backup seems like a better idea. Girl, every time I read your blog I have something to add to my to-do list! LOL That’s not a bad thing, it just means you’re writing about a lot of important topics. Thanks for watching out for us. 😉
You know I’d love to move back to VA! Missing my Va Beach, for sure! I AM super organized, sometimes it’s sickening! lol
Glad you find such value in the blogs, that I’m writing what people need and it gives you ideas. 😉
Love your articles Kristen! I have always done a hard drive backup to an external drive but then a couple years ago I heard Mike Stelzner do a podcast episode about additional measures to put in place. So I have a similar process to the one you describe above. It has helped me out on at least one occasion when I deleted the wrong folder that had course videos stored in it. Eeek. Moment of panic! Then, phew. Had what I needed in two other locations! Vickie
Thanks Vickie! Glad you have your stuff together too… and having the files in case the dreaded delete ooops happens.. and we know it does!
Great information~ Thank you for the warning shot~ I am taking action~
YW Krista, so glad, you should!
I thought I was safe with an external hard drive and I was excited I even knew what that was. All the other stuff is way too organized & technical for me but i still feel safe because my partner has everything & so does our webmaster. I can even ask her for a password.
I have been having very strange issues with my Imac lately, stumping the Sr techs & now logs are going to the engineers. Today is a good day, must be they are gearing up for holiday.
Always love your blogs & this one is no exception. Best to you on the holidays.
I am proud of you Roz.. you are doing great. Glad you have a partner and honest web geek to help you all out as well. That is a GREAT value. Thanks and hope your Christmas/Holiday was fabulous!
I JUST saw this happen to a friend of mine! She knew it was her bad–she hadn’t backed up. But her biz and personal stuff was lost and she had to recreate huge files.
Mine is backed up via 2 different ways, but I hadn’t thought of making a list. I’ll be doing that over my down time! Thank You.
http://www.susanmarymalone.com/7-habits/
She isn’t alone Susan…we ALL think, it won’t happen to me.. until it does.. then we beat our head against the wall thinking.. I knew better, why didn’t I! Glad you have yours set and glad to help.
This is a good reminder to get backups in place. I know I really should, seeing as I lost everything last January when my husband mistakenly erased my external hard drive. It’s amazing how overwhelming it feels at first, but now, nearly a year later, I realize that I can indeed live without those things I once thought were imperative. But it is sensible to back things up.
Girl… you had better… especially since you lost your stuff before.
I know what you mean about the…”I can’t live w/o it”… until you have and then it’s like… well, I really don’t need it that bad. We save things for the “just in case” we need it.
Good reminders. I’ve had my computer crashed two years ago and my website hacked this year. Without a backup I would have been sunk. And I confess, I’ve neglected my backup the last few months. That will be top of my list this week. Thanks Kristen
It is super easy to neglect to do our backups Michelle and just hit that “remind me later” pop up for when it comes up… but are you willing to do w/o all that stuff since the last back up? It’s usually the recent stuff that you need most, right?
As I am writing this comment, I am backing up my files to an external hard drive. It’s on my to do list each week, but some how I do manage to forget to do it until my computer notifies me; “No Back Ups for 19 days” I suppose it’s time to get better at this! I do use dropbox for all documents/files I use so I feel secure in that respect. One time this year when I had to send my trusty laptop out for repairs, I simply hopped onto my husbands computer and logged into dropbox. I haven’t thought about having a cloud back-up but now that you’ve mention it, it makes total sense.
Atta girl… so glad you got yours done Lisa and see the value. That’s what I like about cloud storage (versatility to pop on over to another computer), tho I do worry about the security at times.
Thanks for the list of ways to make sure your computer is protected, Kristen. I do use an external hard-drive to back up my computer, however, perhaps I am not doing it often enough. I do it monthly, as I am not storing a lot of business stuff on mine. I know it will be really handy if I need it and have been doing it since I first got my Macbook back in 2010. An outside source sounds like something worth considering as well and I appreciate the suggestions on which ones to consider. Happy Holidays and happy you know your data is safe and secure…no matter what!
Thanks Beverly and glad you have something set up. I would ask you if you could manage w/o the last month of data since you only do yours monthly… if yes, then maybe you are good to go then. Hope you had a Happy Holiday as well… next is New Years!
Well I actually only have cloud backup, so I guess I would be screwed pretty well with a crash…guess I should set up an external backup.:-)
It depends on what you are backing up Katarina. You might not be screwed, but I’d ask you… if you had a major translation project and lost it, would you have the time to redo it? Maybe backing up the big stuff would be helpful!
Having a computer crash is a nightmare. I back everything up on cloud storage. Makes me nervous when it doesn’t always sync right away, but I wouldn’t lose much. Thanks for the additional tips!
Oh Brenda, I can completely relate, having two in one month makes me nervous EVERY time my computer glitches. ugh
This has happened to me way too many times. I learned the hard way and now I store everything on a cloud storage and an external storage. I make sure I have a back up for everything!
Yep… I am right there with you Elizabeth.. I learned the hard way, ONCE.. now I have my stuff together!
Great points, Kristen. I was planning to back up everything to an external hard drive, but my geek told me they, too, will crash. So now I’m on Google Drive, unlimited storage plan. Everything I have done is there and it automatically saves everything I do every time I save a document Of course, if my computer crashes, I’ll have to replace the operating systems, which can cost as much (if not more than) a new computer.
Thanks Jackie. I guess it depends on how you store your external. If it is connected to the computer and there is a virus, yes, it could be too… but it doesn’t crash automatically if the computer does. I sometimes don’t really like Google drive.. but something is better than nothing. I know, right… replacing the operating systems are expensive, but hopefully you have back ups of those or discs for them.
Great tips! It did happen to me, and having an old backup only was more than frustrating! Since then I do daily backups even from my WordPress sites, they helped me out more than once…
I know the feeling Erika. I learned the first time! And having the back ups saved more headaches later. Thanks!
It took me three crashes to finally learn my lesson about this. I use a mirrored cloud hard drive and also Carbonite now. I think I’m in fairly good shape. 🙂
Ughhh, 3 Liz? You poor thing. I heard of mirrored hard drives but heard it could be confusing too… but glad you have your stuff in order now! 😉
I have now added this to my To-Do list. Thank you for the reminder; I’ve been gambling with my business!
You are quite welcome Stacey… you sure are if you aren’t backing up
Oh my gosh, this is so me. I NEED a back up plan and a back up to my computer! We were just talking about this!! I need it!
Okay girl… get on it Cindy so you won’t lose everything!