February 2013

Most businesses make the HUGE (and costly) error of mistaking a “data

backup” with data recovery and business continuity. NOT true! Simply having a copy of your data stored somewhere does not automatically guarantee you’ll be back up and running again like you were before. To give our readers a better idea of this concept, we’ve included a diagram (below) from the BCM Institute explaining three key concepts: Recovery Point Objective (RPO), Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Maximum Tolerable Outage (MTO, or MTPOD as shown below). In order to choose the RIGHT type of back up for your company, you need to know what these three acronyms mean.

First, the RPO or Recovery Point Objective is the point to where you want your data restored. So, if you can’t afford to lose a day of work, your RPO may be practically “instant,” requiring a snapshot of your workstation or server every 15 minutes. If you can afford to lose a day of work, you only need a backup every night. Next, the RTO

or Recovery Time Objective is the length of time you will be down after a disaster while your workstation or network is restored. Again, different backups will provide shorter

(or much longer) RTO depending on what it takes to restore the data. For example, many businesses are shocked to discover it could take 5-7 days or more to restore all their data from a Carbonite or Mozy backup, plus another couple of days to rebuild everything; and since most businesses cannot afford to be down that long, another type of backup is needed.

And finally, MTO or Maximum Tolerable Outage is the “code red” point in time where you MUST have your data, operations, e-mail and applications back online and

functioning before it would severely threaten your company’s survival. In some cases, businesses cannot afford certain processes to be down for more than a couple of hours, such as online ordering during the holidays for an e-commerce company or payroll processes for a HR company. And often a company can do without their file server for a couple of days, but couldn’t afford to have

their call center down that long before they would start losing business and clients.

The key is to know WHAT data and business processes are MOST critical to you so the proper backup and disaster recovery solution can be put in place now before everything goes kaput (that’s the technical term for “goes wrong”). To get your data recovery handled properly, call us to discuss a Disaster Recovery Review to determine if you truly COULD be back up and running again as fast as you expect, and what you need to do now to guarantee zero unpleasant surprises.

RPO, RTO & MTO - Oh My!Recovery Point Objective Recovery Time Objective Maximum Tolerable Outage

So you’ve bought into the whole social media and online marketing idea and you’re Tweeting, posting to

Facebook, LinkedIn, blogging and using Google+ (not to mention dozens of other online tools and resources) to promote your company. Whew!

However, there’s the little “gotcha” to all of this that you might not have thought about: how do you manage all of this? And how can you keep an eye on these various web sites to make sure you’re not missing a customer service issue, negative post or even a sales opportunity? The answer is Hootsuite.

Hootsuite is an online aggregation tool that allows you to review and manage all your online postings and presence through a simple, easy to use interface. All in one place, you can manage your company’s Twitter accounts, your personal Facebook account, your company Facebook fanpage, your LinkedIn posts, your WordPress blog entries and even more. You can even assign rights to any of your accounts to other team members without ever giving up a single password.

Other helpful features of HootSuite include:• Monitor social mentions of your name or company

wherever they happen.• Pre-schedule posting to happen any time in the future.• Easily post your message across multiple social media

sites with the simple click of a button in your HootSuite portal.

• Create custom reports to see where your traffic goes and what is working

Just about every web site you visit these days wants you to register and choose a password, especially when

making a purchase.

However, if you do this carelessly, you may be setting yourself up as easy prey for online criminals.

Although we know we should choose unique and hard to decipher passwords that contain both numbers and letters, most people still use easy to remember passwords and words for their convenience.

Below are the top 10 passwords used online according to PC Magazine. If you are using any of the following, you’re putting a big red bullseye on your account inviting identity theft:

If you want to avoid having to remember dozens of hard-to-remember passwords, Robo Form is a great FREE software you can download without having to fear adware or spyware.

RoboForm was named PC Magazine Editor’s Choice, and CNET Download.com’s Software of the Year. After you download the software, it memorizes your passwords and logs you in automatically to every web page with one click.

Best of all, it encrypts your passwords and generates random passwords that hackers cannot guess. You can even back up your passwords so you can copy them to another computer.

Do You Roll Out The Red Carpet For Identity Thieves?

1. password2. 1234563. qwerty4. abc1235. letmein

6. monkey7. myspace18. password19. link18210. [your first name]

There’s no doubt about it: e-mail has become the single most important communication tool for businesses. But

messages pile up quick, taking up storage space that can be expensive to back up. And since deleting everything isn’t always an option when certain threads contain important info about projects, contracts and client communications, the smartest option it to archive your inbox.

Archiving is simply a process of removing old (but important) e-mails from your “active” inbox and folders to a compressed, encrypted backup, freeing up space in your inbox and preserving your e-mails should you need to dig them up at some point in the future. Should you archive? The answer is “Yes” for 3 important reasons:

Compliance Regulation: Obviously some businesses, such as medical offices and financial institutions, are affected by this more than others. However, all records pertaining to a company’s activities are subject to compliance regulation, including employee records and communications, e-mail threads discussing contracts or other negotiations and financial documentation. It’s inevitable that you will have e-mail messages touching one or more of these areas that you are required by law to keep for a period of time.

Litigation Support: Almost every company operating will, at some point, be implicated in a lawsuit. When that happens, the court may require you to produce all records and communications relevant to the case in a “timely manner,” no matter how far back the communications took place. If a good e-mail archiving solution wasn’t used, it could cost MORE to conduct the discovery than the cost of the case itself.

Storage Management: If you don’t want to be forced to delete current e-mails to make room for new messages, then archiving is a smart option. Of course, NOT all archiving solutions are created equal! Make sure you consult with us on which one would work best for your company before making any decisions.

What To Do When Your Inbox Is FULL Of Important Messages You Don’t Want To Delete

Donate Now to the 2013

Boys & Girls Club of Marshfield’s

Annual Gift Appeal!

Please donate and help the Boys & Girls Club of Marshfield

continue delivering quality programming that truly makes a difference in the lives of so

many children and their families!To Donate go to

www.MarshfieldBoysAndGirlsClub.com

Saturday, March 2, 2013Boston Marriott Quincy

6:00 pm – MidnightTickets are available for $125 at

www.MarshfieldBoysAndGirlsClub.com

ACTSmart is a proud supporter of the Boys & Girls Club of Marshfield

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Mass Business Resource Network'sFREE 2013 Breakfast Seminar Series

Our Next Seminar is onHow to Grow Your Business!

March 20, 20137:00 am - 10:00 am

At Linden Ponds203 Linden Ponds Way, Hingham, MA 02043

To register go to: www.MBRN.biz/seminars

Don’t forget to save the date for the following two seminars on:

June 12, 2013 & September 18, 2013Topics TBA

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