I am very lucky! I have several offline coaching clients, all with offline businesses, and in fact most of them have more than one business!
Due to the nature of their businesses, they all have physical locations …
I find that I learn A LOT from them, which is wonderful
Here’s a tip from customer K: When you arranged Internet access at your physical office, you deliberately signed up with a DIFFERENT Internet Service Provider than the one you have at home.
Your city was badly hit by storms last week and most of the internet service is down. At home, you can only access the Internet for extremely limited periods of time, but at the office everything is fine: slower than usual but working properly. So, with a little reorganization, you can complete your work online.
Takeaway lesson
Whenever possible, try to spread the risk … in this case, it is having different ISPs for your Internet access or, if you work from home, knowing a public place where you can access the Internet.
In most cases with an offline business, we are not actively working in the business all the time, but we need to keep in touch, be it via email, comments on the website, or both.
Adding social networks like Facebook and Twitter to the mix further complicates things.
Many times, without realizing it, we rely on multiple hardware options to run our empires online.
You may find that you are using a combination of technology to stay in touch, between your smartphone and your computer.
Obviously the smartphone provides redundant backup for email and social media so you’ve got it covered. But keep in mind that your website may need updates or other work, and your smartphone may not provide an efficient way to accomplish those tasks.
Your online redundancy plan
STEP 1
When you have time, take a few minutes and list all the online activities that you participate in over the course of a week. Then think about everything else and see if there are any irregular tasks that don’t appear on that list. These can include tasks or circumstances that occur rarely.
STEP 2
Now, grab that to-do list and identify your MAIN method of access – home computer or smartphone, for example.
STEP 3
Next, decide on a backup access method: it could be an office computer or internet access at the library. In the case of using your smartphone, is there a way to access those resources through your computer? If not, is there another smartphone, like a family member or friend, that I can use in a pinch?
STEP 4
Finally, identify the information you would need to use those backup options … for example, if you might need to use someone else’s smartphone, how would you access YOUR email addresses?
STEP 5
Ask yourself if there is a practical way to provide secure information in a different geographic location, to add another layer of security.
In my case, my sister lives about 400 miles away. A weather disaster affecting me is unlikely to affect her as well, so storing information with her and / or giving her access to my online backups makes sense. Even if I cannot access the information, she can, under my supervision.
Let’s face it, life happens!
We cannot change how it affects us, but we can control how we react. Being prepared for the worst case scenario minimizes the effect a disaster can have on us and our online businesses.
