When business is running smoothly, disaster recovery is often the last thing on your mind. But all it takes is one unexpected event such as a ransomware attack, server failure, or power cut to bring operations to a standstill.
For SMEs every hour of downtime carries real financial and reputational cost. Having a recovery plan for IT systems isn’t a ‘nice to have,’ but an essential.
Despite the risks, many small businesses are underprepared. According to the UK Government’s Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2023, 32% of UK businesses identified a cyber breach or attack in the past 12 months. Smaller firms, in particular, tend to lack formalised recovery plans or dedicated IT support.
Disaster recovery is about more than just backing up files. It’s about building resilience into your business systems so that when something does go wrong, you’re ready to respond quickly and effectively.
Top Disaster recovery strategies for businesses
Here are the top three disaster recovery strategies every SME should consider:
1.Cloud-Based Disaster Recovery and Backup
This strategy involves automatically storing your business-critical data in secure, off-site cloud servers. If your primary systems are compromised, your data can be recovered quickly and efficiently.
Traditional backup methods (like external hard drives or on-premise servers) are vulnerable to theft, damage and localised failures. Cloud-based backup provides a more robust, flexible, and secure solution.
Key Benefits:
- Automated backups reduce the risk of human error.
- Access anywhere: Data is available even if your physical office is not.
- Faster recovery times, minimising costly downtime.
A 2023 report by Databarracks revealed that 59% of UK SMEs experienced some form of data loss in the last 12 months, with those relying solely on local backups taking significantly longer to recover.
2.Hornetsecurity 365 Total Backup and Recovery
Email is still the number one communication tool for SMEs, and the most common entry point for cybercriminals. A single malicious link can lead to days of downtime and data loss.
According to Hornetsecurity, over 80% of cyberattacks start via email, and 1 in 4 SMEs experience at least one email-related security incident per year.
Hornetsecurity’s 365 Total Backup and Recovery covers the total recovery of email items and files on Microsoft 365.
Other key benefits of Hornetsecurity:
- Intuitive interface provides a comprehensive view of all backup and recovery operations.
- Tailored retention reporting: Supports compliance with multiple standards and regulations including ISO27001 and GDPR.
- Flexible restoration options for Microsoft 365 mailboxes, Teams conversations, OneDrive data and SharePoint content.
3.Business Continuity Planning (BCP)
A business continuity plan ensures that your entire organisation can continue to function in the face of disruption. It covers logistics, communication, staffing, and service delivery.
While backups can restore data, the additional help of staff who know what to do when disaster strikes are crucial. BCP provides the framework needed to keep operations ticking over, whatever happens.
Key Benefits:
- Reduces the impact of disruption on customers and staff.
- Provides clear roles and procedures during crises.
- Supports compliance and builds customer trust.
Tailored Disaster Recovery Strategies For Businesses
With the right strategy in place, you can reduce risk, limit downtime, and give your team the confidence to handle unexpected disruptions.
At QiC Systems, we help small businesses to choose the right backup and recovery method to suit your budget and level of risk. Through trusted solutions like Hornetsecurity, we provide advanced email protection, backup services and recovery tools that are built specifically for small business needs.
Talk to our experts today about how we can implement high strength, reliable backup and recovery methods. Complete a contact form and we will get back to you as soon as possible.