Backups as Business Insurance: Sell Confidence, Not Storage

Today we're exploring a topic that's not always easy to talk about, but it's a really important one - why service providers often struggle with selling backups to their clients.

Now, we all know backups are crucial for a business. They're important for compliance, cybersecurity insurance, and just keeping everything running smoothly. But, the thing is, sometimes backups are seen as just storage space that's sold by the TB, instead of being seen as a vital part of a business's operations.

And that's where the problem comes in. As service providers, it's up to us to understand how our clients think and educate them on why having a reliable backup solution in place is so important.

Selling Tech vs Value

One of the biggest challenges we face is that we're often tech-savvy ourselves. And while that can be a huge asset when it comes to delivering the service, it can make it harder to sell it. It's easy to get caught up in all the technical details of backups and forget to communicate the real value of what we're offering.

But, the thing is, not all of our clients have the same level of technical understanding that we do. And that's okay. What's important is that we explain the value of backups in a way that our clients can understand.

So, how do we do that? Well, for starters, we need to shift from selling storage to selling insurance. We need to emphasize the importance of having a solid disaster recovery plan in place, highlight the potential consequences of not having one, and talk about the different types of disasters that can happen - like natural disasters, cyber attacks, and hardware failures. And when we can, we should share real-life examples of companies that have suffered because they didn't have proper backups.

Customers of Sahelay are able to offer this to clients. We can position backups as insurance, monitored by Sahelay Central, providing confidence in the recoverability of data with automated test restores, and tailored to their requirements with Veeam and storage locations from around the world. With Sahelay, your clients know you've done well by them.

Tailor Fit and Personal

And one of the biggest values we can offer as service providers is that we can tailor the solution to fit each client's specific needs. Every business is different and has its own set of requirements. We can work with our clients to understand what they need and offer different backup frequencies, retention periods, and recovery options to suit.

Using a trusted company for your backup target, such as Sahelay, you can give clients confidence that their data will be recoverable in case of a disaster. This typically means regularly testing backup and recovery processes and offering a service level agreement (SLA) that guarantees a certain recovery time (or RTO). 

Build Rapport

And on top of all that, backups serve as an opportunity to build trust with clients. This can be done by regularly communicating with them about the status of their backups, being transparent about the backup process, and making sure they know their data is safe and secure with a vendor like Sahelay.

Being proactive and identifying potential issues before they happen, and providing solutions to prevent them, gives clients confidence. For example, if a client is using a storage target that is low on storage, you'll need to either clear unnecessary data, add more storage, or change your backup strategy.

TL;DR Version:

The key to remember is that backups are not just about storage. They're about protecting a business's valuable data in case of data loss. By positioning backups as insurance, tailoring solutions to meet each client's specific needs, providing confidence in the recoverability of data, and building trust with clients, we can effectively sell backups and keep our clients' businesses safe.

Please reach out to us to discuss how Sahelay can keep your data safe. We're keen to play our role in being your last layer of defense against data loss.