Step 1: Plan for data backup

  • Think about where you keep your backup.
  • Store a full backup at another location to protect against fire, theft, or other disaster.
  • If your data is critical it may be a good idea to have a quarterly and yearly backup as well so that you can recover files that may have been deleted, but not discovered until months later.

Step 2: Begin a backup routine

  • Make backing up a part of your normal scheduled daily tasks.
  • Don't count on anyone else to back your data up for you.
  • Do backups of your own critical data.

Step 3: Tailor your backup strategy to your needs

  • To determine the best schedule for your data backup, it is important to know how often your data changes. If your data changes weekly, a daily backup might be overkill. If you have critical data that updates every hour, you may need to back up several times a day.

  • Full backups can be supplemented by incremental backups. An incremental backup will only back up files that have changed since the last full backup, and is normally much quicker than a full backup.

    For example, If you run an incremental backup at the end of each work day, it protects all your newest data if anything happens overnight, and all of the data not backed up by the incremental backup is still protected by the full backup you may run every weekend.


Step 4: Be sure to test your backup periodically

Don't simply rely on backup software to get it right 100% of the time, no matter how good you think your backup software is. To ensure that your backups are protecting you, periodically test the backup jobs by attempting to restore them to an alternate location. This will bring out any flaws or corrupt data before it is too late.

Also, most backup applications also have a "backup log" or generate a "backup report" that can quickly identify any problems or skipped files in the backup job. Be sure to review these logs every time your backups complete for anything suspicious.