A list of Backup & Disaster Recovery (BDR) Tools for MSPs

I’ve written before about Why your MSP business should offer Offsite Data Backup to clients. Backup & Disaster Recovery (BDR) Tools for MSPs are a useful way to lower your cost of support and increase your revenue.

One of the most common questions I’m asked about MSP-focused BDR tools is “Which backup tool should I use?”

Choosing an MSP-friendly BDR Tool

There are a LOT of backup & disaster recovery tools out there.

As a Managed Service Provider (MSP), you want to be looking for a BDR tool that is multi-tenanted. That is to say, the software can handle backups across multiple clients — not just different sites!

Each client’s backup data must be kept separate from others for data protection and security reasons.

When choosing a BDR tool, you’d also be looking for one that offers MSP-friendly licensing.

Most traditional backup tools are purchased per-server or workstation. That licensing scenario may not serve your MSP well, and you should look for a software-as-a-service license.

Offering Backup-as-a-Service

Finally, you want to decide how you are going to offer your client’s backup-as-a-service.

Will you use on hardware device on-site, with backups synchronised to the cloud?
Where will your MSP backup client data to? The public cloud or a private cloud?
What type of backup will you offer clients? File and folder backup, image-based backup, or a combination of both?
Are you going to offer your clients a backup service, a disaster recovery service, or both?

If you’re unsure how to answer these questions, then speak to your peers at a local user group (here’s a list of User Groups for UK Managed Service Providers), ask a question in an online MSP community such as The Tech Tribe, or schedule a call with me to discuss your specific situation.