Five reasons why you need an IT Disaster Recovery Plan
Whether your business is large or small, you need a Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP) in place.
In an ideal world, your company’s data would always remain intact. In other words, a data disaster wouldn’t be a thing.
But we don’t live in a perfect world. And disasters are all too real.
The unfortunate thing is that many company owners believe that nothing bad will happen to their data until it finally does happen and runs them out of business.
Here is a rundown of five reasons why an IT Disaster Recovery Plan is so important for businesses.
What Exactly is a Disaster Recovery Plan?
This type of plan is a plan that essentially combines proven disaster resolutions and data backup to accomplish the following three goals:
- Ensure uptime
- Maximize productivity
- Diminish the loss of data
Put another way, no matter what type of error or trouble plagues your data, your business’s information will remain safe, thus protecting you against the several problems outlined below.
1. Your Business’s Reputation Will Be Harmed
You certainly know the power of word-of-mouth, especially when you have customers or partners promoting your services.
News travels fast and your company reputation can be badly harmed because you weren’t able to deliver services as promised.
When disaster strikes, customers may be supportive and patient for a few hours, especially if you’ve put everything in place in advance so they can have at least minimal services.
But this is the era of social media, which means you can’t be sure your disgruntled customers will keep the news to themselves.
2. Potential Clients Will Be Afraid to Do Business with You in the Future
We all have big plans for our businesses and we see globalisation and the Internet as opportunities to reach more customers.
But there are also situations where you’d love to have the “right to be forgotten” online. Unfortunately, posts from unhappy clients may not be deleted after you’ve fixed their issue.
If you tend to delete negative comments on your own social media posts, you might end up with more negative press than sympathy.
You have to see your online identity and reputation as a business card for many of your future clients.
3. Unsatisfied Customers Will Leave You
It’s not hard to understand. Today’s customers aren’t patient because they don’t have to be.
Your customers rely on you for specific products and services. When they can’t have what they’re paying for right away, they’ll leave you for a better offer down the road.
This means you’ll lose revenue immediately. And it can become a long-term problem because these clients might never come back to you.
The way you handle disasters can result in a big churn for your company!
4. Your Employees Will Jump Ship
Your employees will be unhappy because they’ll be under pressure to satisfy disgruntled clients.
They can feel helpless if their usual tools (emails, phones, software, etc.) are not available.
This can also affect their self-esteem. If your employees can’t work because of a disaster that you didn’t prepare for, they won’t be happy.
Their salary and lifestyle will be at stake. Don’t expect them to thank you for your negligence!
5. You May Have to Release Staff
As we mentioned earlier, client churn might cause your business to lose revenue. Consequently, you might have to decrease salaries — or worse — impose layoffs because you’ll have to reduce your staff.
This means firing people who’ve been loyal to you for many years. It’s very easy to go from running a prosperous company to filing for bankruptcy. It’s in your interest to avoid this situation!
What a Disaster Recovery Plan Should Look Like
So, it’s clear that having a Disaster Recovery plan is in order. But where do you start?
For starters, realise that although some data problems can be resolved in minutes or hours, others may require days or even weeks or months. So, while you’re trying to resolve a data situation, you need to have a temporary solution in place.
Of course, this temp solution must be able to deliver a level of service that is relatively normal, which means you need to keep your data up to date before a data incident occurs.
In addition, as part of the data disaster resolution process, be prepared to reinstall your computers’ operating systems. This means you’ll need dependable backup copies of your databases and files to quickly rebuild everything.
How We Can Help You
We are a leading provider of managed IT services in the South East of England.
Contact us to learn more about how to create a Disaster Recovery Plan, or visit our Disaster Recovery Planning page for further information.