Downtime can cripple any business, but for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMBs) that lack the extensive IT resources of larger companies, it can be particularly devastating. The latest research shows SMBs can lose up to $88,000 per hour due to downtime. That’s not just about lost sales—lost productivity, delayed services, and damaged reputations.
While traditional data backups are essential, they don’t offer a complete solution. SMBs need to think bigger, beyond just recovering data, to how they can get their entire business running again quickly. This is where business continuity comes in. In this post, we’ll explain why business continuity is vital for SMBs, the role of recovery metrics like Recovery Time Objective (RTO), and how to choose the right solution to safeguard your business.
The True Cost of Downtime
Downtime is expensive, and the numbers show that it’s a critical issue for Canadian SMBs:
- 50% of SMBs report it took 24 hours or longer to recover from a cyberattack.
- 51% of small businesses experienced website downtime of 8-24 hours after an attack.
- 40% of SMBs that faced a cyberattack endured at least 8 hours of downtime.
Downtime costs $88,000 per hour, or $1,467 per minute. For companies that experience frequent outages, the financial impact can be even more significant. Businesses with regular downtime or brownouts face 16 times higher costs than those with fewer disruptions.
Network outages and human error are the leading causes of downtime. This means that downtime isn’t just about natural disasters; something as simple as a server malfunction or an employee error can bring your business to a standstill. Without a clear recovery plan, the consequences could be disastrous.
Backup vs. Business Continuity
Many SMBs rely on data backups, but this isn’t enough to ensure quick recovery. Backup ensures that your data is saved and can be restored, but it doesn’t necessarily guarantee a swift return to normal operations. In a crisis, restoring your data could take hours or even days—time your business can’t afford to lose.
On the other hand, business continuity is a complete strategy that focuses on resuming operations as quickly as possible. This requires more than just saving your data; it involves a detailed plan for quickly getting your systems, data, and employees back to work. This is where the Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Recovery Point Objective (RPO) come into play:
- RTO: The maximum time your business can afford to be down before suffering major damage.
- RPO: The maximum amount of data you can afford to lose, measured in time (for example, losing 1 hour of data).
A solid business continuity plan is designed to meet your RTO and RPO targets, ensuring your business can recover swiftly from any disruption.
The Role of Hybrid Cloud Backup
SMBs often struggle to choose between local backups and cloud backups. Both have benefits, but neither provides a complete solution. The best option is a hybrid cloud backup, which combines the speed of local backups with the security of off-site cloud storage.
- Local backups allow for fast recovery since data is stored on-site, but they’re vulnerable to physical damage, theft, or disasters.
- Cloud backups provide secure off-site storage, protecting against physical damage, but can be slower to restore due to bandwidth limitations.
A hybrid solution gives SMBs the best of both worlds—quick restores from local backups for minor issues and secure, off-site cloud backups for more significant disasters.
Evron EV Backup is designed to take the stress out of data protection and recovery. By combining both local and cloud backups, it offers a simple and efficient way to keep your data safe and accessible. Whether you’re dealing with a minor issue or a major disruption, EV Backup helps you get back to business quickly, with the assurance that your data is secure and easy to restore. It’s an easy-to-use, reliable solution that gives you peace of mind, knowing your important information is protected.
How to Calculate Your RTO and RPO
Understanding your business’s specific RTO and RPO needs is crucial for creating a successful business continuity plan. Here’s a simple formula to calculate these metrics:
- Identify Critical Employees: Determine how many employees will be affected if critical data is unavailable.
- Calculate Costs: Estimate the average hourly wage, overhead costs, and potential revenue loss due to downtime.
- Estimate Tolerable Downtime: How long can your business be offline before it starts experiencing significant damage?
For instance, if you can only tolerate 2 hours of downtime before your operations are seriously affected, your RTO should be no longer than 2 hours. If losing more than 30 minutes of data would create major problems, your RPO should be set to 30 minutes.
For more details on backup vs. business continuity and how to calculate RTO and RPO, check out our full white paper here.
What to Look for in a Business Continuity Vendor
When selecting a business continuity solution, Canadian SMBs need to consider several important factors:
- Superior RTO and RPO Guarantees: Choose a vendor to meet your specific recovery time and point objectives.
- Hybrid Cloud Backup: Ensure the solution includes local and cloud backup options to provide the most flexible and resilient protection.
- Image-Based Backup: Image-based backups create exact copies of your system, allowing for faster recovery than file-based backups.
- Screenshot Backup Verification: Ensure your backups are working correctly with verification that your data is being successfully backed up.
Choosing the right business continuity vendor ensures your business is prepared for anything, from a minor outage to a full-scale disaster.
Why Choose Evron as Your Business Continuity Partner
At Evron, we understand that downtime can have a severe impact on your business, which is why we focus on more than just backups. We work closely with you to ensure that your business can recover quickly and keep moving forward in the event of a disruption. Our approach focuses on minimizing downtime, using a mix of local and cloud solutions to provide a fast, reliable recovery process. With decades of experience and a commitment to supporting Canadian SMBs, we’re here to help ensure your business is always prepared.
In Closing
It’s no longer enough for SMBs to simply back up their data. With downtime costing businesses $88,000 per hour and cyberattacks becoming more frequent, it’s crucial to have a comprehensive business continuity plan that ensures you can recover quickly. By understanding your RTO and RPO needs, using a hybrid cloud solution, and partnering with a reliable vendor, you can protect your business from the severe financial impact of downtime and data loss.
Ready to ensure your business is prepared for any disruption? Download our white paper to learn more or schedule a consultation with our team today.
