Yes, this is a cloud issue, but the trends are very clear.

Now that virtually all business-critical data resides on SaaS platforms, data custodians are increasingly concerned with backing up and securing it there. In fact, projections have the cloud backup market reaching $4.13bn in 2022, growing at a very healthy 26% CAGR.

So for wise MSPs seeking to expertly guide their data custodian customers, the key question has become not one of need, but of method—because not all cloud backup offerings are created equal.

Which criteria should an MSP apply when choosing cloud backup and recovery? There are a good many factors to consider. Let’s explore seven of the most important ones.

1. Lowering the cost of downtime

We may as well begin with the bottom line, because data breaches are more than an inconvenience: they are an expensive inconvenience. This means that cost-effective cloud backup must minimize the financial impacts of downtime using two key metrics: the time between backups and the time required to recover.

How? Cloud backup platforms should let MSPs customize the amount of time between backups and be robust enough to enable backups on demand, at any time. Just as importantly, solutions should not enforce storage or retention limits, so that MSPs can recover data from any point in time, again minimizing the downtime impact.

Ideal cloud backup and recovery should be responsive by being flexible, enabling recovery that’s granular, point-in-time, cross-user, cross-org, or, when necessary, all of the above.

2. Generating MRR

But what about the MSPs bottom line? Aside from lowering costs for customers, MSPs should take a hard look at cloud backup offerings that deliver a bankable Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) for the MSP itself.

Importantly, vendors need to be as committed to MRR goals as the MSPs. To this end, MSPs should ask if the vendor offers things like bundled packages, monthly and annual plans, dedicated support channels, easy customer management tools, pre-sales, and marketing support.

3. Offering multi-platform support

These days, offering backup support for all the major SaaS platforms – Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Salesforce, Dropbox, Box, and others – is critical for an MSP with a range of customer types. Further, essential applications for major SaaS platforms should be backed up as well. For example, Microsoft 365 backup should cover Mail, Calendar, Contacts and Tasks, Teams, OneDrive, and SharePoint. 

4. Delivering ease of use

The ideal backup and recovery solution hits the cloud running, so to speak, and presents a low-maintenance path to confidently restoring data accurately and quickly. Clearly, it’s preferable to find a backup solution that requires zero installation and minimal support.

5. Ensuring flexible coverage

If a cloud backup vendor insists on restrictive commitments in customer size, software requirements, and backup storage limits, locations, and types, MSPs would be wise to seek more accommodating alternatives.

Specifically, MSPs should have the option to backup to their own storage and/or export backups to a storage type of their choice. As remember, MSPs should be able to recover easily at any granular level, from any point-in-time, and across any organization.

6. Pricing without surprises

With pricing, transparency is always key. MSPs should clarify precisely what’s included in a backup offering. Unlimited storage? Restrictions on number of users and backup size? High-volume enterprise pricing and goodwill discounts for non-profits and educational customers? No extra fess for upgrades, software licenses, plugins, training, or support? The best vendors will supply the right answers.

7. Coming from a reputable source

This criterion might sound easy, but how do you define reputable? Let us count the ways. MSPs should choose a cloud backup vendor that is GDPR- and HIPAA-compliant, can provide a Business Associate Agreement (BAA), can encrypt data at-rest and in-transit, offers a choice of local data centers, and adheres to no data retention after deletion and privacy by design. Phew! When you add all that up, it’s a big ask, but there’s one solution that we know qualifies on this and all previous criteria as well.

MSPs pass every test with Augmentt Engage

We’re proud and excited to say that our Augmentt Engage backup and recovery solution confidently ticks all the assorted boxes mentioned above. It’s a proven, flexible, and user-friendly cloud-to-cloud platform that some 500k users rely on for 3.5 million backups each week across Microsoft Office 365, Salesforce and Google Workspace. It’s the real deal and the performance numbers bear that out.

Engage gives MSPs audit-compliant unlimited backup storage, unlimited retention, and exceptional tier-one support—all at one price and with no fine print.

So, as mentioned, MSPs offering cloud backup services to customers is pretty much a no-brainer these days. The MSPs set apart will be those that offer the best method.