Backup Guide For Your Cloud Hosted Ecommerce Website
Do you have an insurance policy? If yes, then you already understand the importance of a backup. Despite the precautions and the security measures you put in place, there is always a chance of a disaster. That is when a backup or insurance comes handy. When you own a website, a backup is nothing less than insurance against unforeseen disasters. Imagine a new virus getting through the most advanced security tools and creating havoc on your site. Without a backup, you would have nowhere to turn to.
Over the last two decades, e-commerce platforms have transformed the way we shop. From a pin to a car, there is nothing that you can’t buy on an e-commerce website today. With thousands of people browsing through hundreds of pages and products, these sites are highly prone to cyber threats. While many e-commerce platforms look for a Cloud Hosting Provider that offers the most advanced security, they need an insurance cover to protect against potential mishaps. If you are an e-commerce site owner, then read on to find a backup guide for your Cloud-Hosted e-commerce website.
Talk to your Cloud Host about its Backup Policy
When you buy a Cloud Hosting plan, check with the host about the backup policy. Most providers offer an automated daily backup of your website as a part of the package. Understand how frequently they take backups, where do they store it, how quickly you can restore data if needed, etc. Remember, this cannot be your sole backup. You must take a manual backup on a local drive too. An e-commerce platform handles sensitive information about its customers. Hence, check all the details.
Ensure that your backup is comprehensive
An e-commerce website is usually large in size. Hence, while backing up, many site owners tend to choose the parts of the website that are crucial and leave out the rest to save time. For example, some site owners backup the database and theme but skip the images since they occupy a lot of space. While this can ensure that your backup completes quickly, if your site gets attacked, you won’t be able to restore your site and get it running quickly. Hence, try to keep your backup as comprehensive as possible.
Determine the best time to back up your site
Backups can put a lot of strain on your server’s resources and affect the performance of your site. Therefore, most e-commerce platforms try to keep this activity for non-peak hours. However, most e-commerce platforms cater to global audiences. Hence, finding non-peak hours can be difficult. Also, backing up the data once every 24-hours can mean that in case of an attack, you can lose up to a day’s data. Hence, for these platforms, real-time backups are ideal solutions. Organize it well so that it does not impact your site’s performance.
Test the Backups
Imagine having backups at three different places, but when disaster strikes and you try to restore the data, your site doesn’t work! Maybe you missed backing up some crucial files, or there was something wrong about the way you were backing up the data. You will never know unless you test it before time. Hence, you must regularly test if your backups can be restored quickly and everything runs fine after restoring the site.
Summing Up
Creating a backup is a crucial part of your website maintenance as it allows you to offer uninterrupted services even when under attack by online threats. We hope that this guide helps you create efficient backups and widen the safety net to protect your site against any eventuality. Conduct some research about various backup options available, talk to your host, and create a backup strategy carefully. While it might seem excessive now, when disaster strikes, you will be glad that you paid attention to it before time. Good Luck!