Tis the season for traffic spikes, gift guides, and last-minute promos—the worst time for your website to go down. Many businesses back up servers and shared files but forget their website. Most sites live on third-party platforms (WordPress hosts, Amazon, Squarespace, etc.), and while those providers keep the lights on, their terms usually limit responsibility for your actual content. If a plugin update goes Grinchy or a hacker sneaks in, you could face costly downtime and a painful rebuild.
What to Back Up (Put Everything in Santa’s Sack)
- Files: themes/templates, plugins, custom code, media uploads.
- Database: posts/pages, products, orders, forms, users, settings.
- Configs & keys: wp-config/.env, .htaccess/nginx rules, API keys (stored securely).
- DNS/CDN settings: zone files, redirects, cache rules, SSL certs.
How Often? (Match the Holiday Hustle)
- Busy/e-commerce sites: daily full backups + hourly database diffs where possible.
- Active content sites: daily or weekly.
- Brochure sites: weekly at minimum.
Where to Store (3-2-1, Like Reindeer in Formation)
Follow 3-2-1: 3 copies, 2 different media, 1 off-site.
Use off-platform, encrypted, versioned storage (e.g., S3/Backblaze) with immutable retention (30–90 days) so a stealthy December compromise doesn’t follow you into January.
Automate—and Don’t Trust Snapshots Alone
- Keep host backups and site-level scheduled exports (files + DB).
- Treat VM/container snapshots as convenience only, not your sole safety net.
- Document your restore runbook and keep scripts alongside (but not inside) the backups.
Test Restores (Your Dress Rehearsal Before Christmas Eve)
Quarterly, restore to staging and time it:
- Check login, checkout/forms, search, sitemap/robots.txt, redirects, SSL, and critical pages.
- Record RTO/RPO so you know how fast you can be back—and how much data you might lose.
Secure the Backup Path (Keep the Naughty List Out)
- Least-privilege service accounts; rotate keys; restrict buckets by IP/VPC.
- Enable MFA-delete/retention locks where available.
- Monitor for unusual access or mass deletions.
Holiday Side Tip: Uptime & Change Monitoring
If your business rides on seasonal traffic, add:
- Uptime monitors checking every 1–5 minutes with SMS/app alerts.
- Change detection on key pages and DNS.
- WAF + malware scanning so backups don’t just preserve problems.
Quick Christmas Checklist
- Automated daily backups of files + database
- Off-site, encrypted, versioned storage (3-2-1)
- 30–90 day immutable retention
- Quarterly test restores with sign-off
- Documented RTO/RPO + restore runbook
- Uptime and security monitoring enabled
Give yourself the gift of resilience: a solid backup, a practiced restore, and holiday-ready monitoring. Need a hand setting it up or sanity-checking your current plan? Contact F8 Consulting for a free consultation.