If you already have a website, you know that there’s a company out there somewhere that is “hosting” your site. The pages of your website reside on the hosting company’s server. The hosting company is responsible for backing up the entire server, and for making sure the server and the internet connection stay up, so that your site (and the other 100 sites on the same piece of equipment) stays up and available for visitors.

Website owners often expect the hosting company to be invincible. After all, these companies are experts in their field and should have thought of everything in the event of a disaster, right?

Well, they have thought of everything, from THEIR point of view. They backup their servers, so if a server crashes, they can move all the data over to a new server and be up and running. They have redundant circuits to the internet, so that if one circuit goes down, there’s another circuit from a different provider ready to handle the traffic.

But who is thinking about the individual website and the disasters that can befall it?

You are. As the website’s owner, it’s up to you to have a disaster recovery plan.

• What if you upload some new pages and accidentally wipe out four good pages that you need. Can you recover them?
• What if the hosting company you’ve been with for years goes out of business without warning? Do you have a complete copy of your website and all the registrar information?
• What if you get a sales pitch from another hosting company with a much better price, and you want to move your site? Do you know what software you need to make sure the new company supports?

Internet savvy consumers have come to expect websites to be always available. Make sure you’re in a position to get your website up as quickly and as painlessly as possible, if disaster strikes.