Getting Your Backup – Why Backup a Website?

One of the most common questions I get asked by a new customer is “Do I need to backup my web site regularly?” The answer is quite simply yes!
Now I know all our users have different websites and they all have different back up needs. A small 8 page website that has few modifications, won’t need such a detailed back up strategy, as a highly dynamic E-commerce outlet, that stores customer and product data. However we al need back ups.

First of all the small 8 page site, should be making regular modifications, especially if they want to stay ahead in the google rankings. My motto is “A good website is NEVER finished.” A website manager should have a regular program of updating content. But despite that, even the most basic of our web packages comes with email, and you will most likely have an email account. Now that is dynamic, changing daily, and may well contain important and sensitive information. What would you do if you lost all those emails?

Don’t you Provide a Free Backup Service?

Yes we do! However this is a nightly backup only with the retention of one night. So if you spot something on your site that went wrong a week ago, there is not much you can do about it as that back up will already have been overwritten. Our nightly backups are generally for catastrophic failures so we can get your most recent version of your site up and running as quickly as possible.

What other options are there?

Fortunately we have partnered with CodeGuard who provide a full backup and malicious code scanning service of those backed up files. You data is taken, compressed and encrypted, and then sent off site to Amazon’s S3 servers. Codeguard offers Daily automatic backup with a simple one click restore so you can get your site back on line as quickly as possible. It also includes email back up for all our Personal Hosting Customers. (Business and Community customers who use of Business and Enhanced business email already have 30 day backups included.)
If you have a WordPress site, CodeGuard has its very own plugin where you can manage the backup interface from inside your WordPress installation.

You can also backup an unlimited number of files and databases – you are restricted only by the storage space you use.

For full details of this optional extra click here.

So Back Ups Are Important?

Yes they are. With the best will in the world things go wrong. You might accidentally upload some malware to your site, or break a file when you are editing it. Or delete and email just a few days before you need it again. In addition there are the catastrophic errors where you can lose all your data. Fortunately with an off site back up, we can always get it back – and more importantly, get it back quickly.

Other Backup Plugins – Think Recovery

Of course, you are free to use other plugins for the software you have chosen to use. Always check that it makes the back up OUTSIDE of your server space. It’s in our terms and conditions that you don’t keep backup files there. Try to use service that stores your files in a reputable location, such as Amazon S3, Dropbox or Microsoft Azure etc. The final thing to make sure is taking the back up is the easy part – sometimes restoring the files can be a real headache. I has a customer once, who religiously backed up his files nightly and paid a fortune to transfer and store them off site. Sensibly, he encrypted all his data before sending it over. Unfortunately when a problem arose and he has to make an urgent restore he couldn’t remember the encryption password and all the data was lost!

About Us

Hipposerve is a UK based company offering Web hosting, domain names, specialist email services and a range of other features to help you make your online statement. We offer outstanding customer support that always works on a personal level. You will always be treated as an individual – not just another customer. We also have a range of tools to help get you started:

Hipposerve Domain Tools

1. Domain Price List – updated daily
2. Domain Promotions – updated daily
3. Domain Suggestion Tool – (this is currently only compatible with a few tlds, but can be used to find good names for the others)
4. Domain Registration – (this allows you to filter down the tld’s into different categories to make it easier to find them)

Ordering a hosting package is a fully automated process which can be completed from our website. If however you wish to discuss package options with us, or any other hosting related query;  just drop us a line at our support desk.

You can also phone us on 0330 043 1502.

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