Do you Backup Your Blog?

Ask yourself this- when was the last time you‘ve backup your blog? What would you do if you lost all of the data on your blog and all you had left was your backup? You may think that you will never have a reason to it will never happen to you, but there are more reasons than just server crashes and hackers why you might need to use  backup to get your site back up and running … You can spare yourself the heartache of losing all of your hard work, if you bank on a data backup strategy that you can do yourself and this is the best insurance there is against the possibility of losing everything.

Back Up And Restore Keys For Computer Data Security

What are some of the reasons I might need to use a backup

• Security Attacks – Since security threats are the most common way people lose their blogs, it’s the biggest reason you should have some kind of backup system in place.
• Server Problems – I have heard lots stories of those who have had  servers that have crashed and they lost everything that was on their site.  Don’t think this can’t happen to you.  All of the hard work you put into your blog can be lost and it usually happens without any warning to prepare you for it.  But by having a  backup of your blog you can make sure that even if your server  melts down, you will be able to get your site up and running again in a matter of minutes instead of days and weeks.
• Viruses and Malware – yes your blog can be impacted by Viruses and Malware too.
• Problems with Upgrading Wordpress, upgrading plugins or installing new ones – There is a reason that Wordpress asks you to back up everytime they have a major release.
• Blogger – Your account can be disabled without warning if they feel you have ‘broken the rules’ and you can loose everything. Don’t risk it.

How often should I backup?

Well that depends on how much you are willing to risk (and potentially lose).  It is your decision.

How many backups should I keep?

My general recommendation is that you keep at least three backups and keep them in three different places or forms. This prevents problems if a single backup becomes corrupted or damaged.

Can backups be automated?

Yes. There are several methods of automating the backup process available, and we’ve listed some below.
However, it is highly recommended that you back up those auto backups with a manual backup once in a while to guarantee that the process is working.

What are my backup options?

Here are a collection of some of the backup options that are available out there for Wordpress and Blogger.

Wordpress – Premium Cloud Services

• Vaultpress – VaultPress provides realtime, continuous backup and synchronization of every post, comment, media file, revision and dash­board setting across at least two separate cloud services in addition to the Automattic grid, ensuring no loss of content. It is good but it costs.
• BlogVault – BlogVault  backups everything off your site, and has a Test Restore where it puts a working version of your site Restored on their website to prove it all works!
• CodeGuard – With CodeGuard all plans allow for daily automatic backups, monitoring, and restores without limitation. The main difference is that with the Enterprise plan you are allowed the option of a concierge restore. A concierge restore is when one of their developer team takes personal time to oversee the process of your restore from beginning to end to ensure its success.
• BackupBuddy – This premium WordPress backup plugin is designed to not only backup your entire WP site but to help you restore it and migrate it elsewhere when needed. As suggested this plugin backs up everything associated with your WP website including plugins, themes, widgets, and the database.

Wordpress – Free Cloud Services

• Wordpress Backup to Dropbox – this plugin makes backup very easy and simple.
• Wordpress for Google Drive – Great for regular users of Google Drive.
• Blogbackupr – Works with both Wordpress and Blogger.
• Online Backup For WordPress – This backup lets you backup 50 MB of your database on their secure servers. This isn’t a complete solution as it only backs up your WP database.

Wordpress – Other Free Plugin Tools Services

• Snapshot is a new, easy-to-use plugin for creating quick snapshots of your database. Snapshot Backup sends a copy of your Database, current WP Core, all your Themes, Plugins and Uploads to the FTP repository of your choice. It’s especially useful for testing and rolling out new functionality to your website. You can play with new plugin and/or theme settings with the full knowledge that you’ll be able to roll back your database tables.
• WP DB Manager – The plugin permits the WP blog owner to schedule automatic backups of his site’s database (via email or server backup) or manually download it. It also allows the admin to select which database table items to backup and either optimize, repair, delete, or restore the database. Perhaps the most enticing aspect of this WP backup plugin is that it is very easy to install and use. The major drawback of this plugin however, is that it merely backs up your database and not your entire WordPress blog.

Wordpress – the Old Fashion way

Plugins can be really useful for backing up your site but depending on its size it might be better to do it from the sever. You can run a script to backup your WordPress site to FTP. Another option is to set up a cron job to automatically backup your WordPress site. If you have a very large database, WPMU.org has a guide that will help you back it up smoothly without timeouts.

Blogger

I am not a blogger user (anymore) and I have found trying to get some automated blogger backup tools alot harder than Wordpress. Of course you can manually export your blog from Blogger (as you can also do from Wordpress) but the range of options for backing up your blogger site automatically seem to me rather limited .. here is what I could find.

• Blogbackupr – Works with both Wordpress and Blogger
• BloggerBackup – Blogger Backup has a simple, straightforward interface and allows you to save posts and comments, with the ability to filter by date if you want.
• BlogCollector 

So what are you waiting for … go and back up your blog. While I hope it is not the case I can assure you that some time in the future you will be glad that you did.

Images: 99club