What about Your Data?
Cloud Service Providers look after operating system and application backups – but what about your data? Data is the lifeblood of your business and to lose it could prove to be fatal. When you’re looking at a Cloud Service Provider, be it for email marketing services, accounting software, customer relationship management – you need to be sure that you can export your data regularly so that if the worst came to the worst, you still have your key business data.
And when you’re looking at this exported data, it needs to be in a format that you can use. A CSV file of data will probably be fine because you can open it with an editor. Likewise, a zip file of original binary data (such as images and documents). But a proprietary backup file could be problematic if you don’t have an application elsewhere to open it.
Some Cloud systems and applications don’t allow you to export your data. Have you tried getting an export of all your Facebook posts or LinkedIn data? That’s often the price you’ll pay for utilising free systems.
So, when you look at Software as a Service, applications in the Cloud – be sure that you can regularly export your data. Let the Cloud Operator worry about keeping the application running while you make sure that you have access to your data in a form that you can use elsewhere.
For a chat about how CRM could help your business, give us a call on 01279 882290
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