Next Week, July 23^rd to 30^th, is WordPress Backup Week and I encourage you all to backup you blogs.

I have recently started backing up my site using skippy‘s excellent wp-db-backup plugin. If you don’t want to use a plugin to do your backups Podz has some excellent instructions for setting up a cron job to do the backups.

One thing that is worth noting which ever backup route you take is that you should keep your backups off-site to be safe. What I mean by this is that using a cron job/plugin to create backups which are then emailed to an account hosted on the same server as your blog is not necessarily a wise idea.

In the worst case scenario where the site hosting you blog goes down and your database is lost it is likely that anything else kept on the server will be lost as well. Therefore it is best to store you backups somewhere separate from the site hosting your blog. One easy way of achieving this is to set up a special gmail account solely for storing your backup’s (and see how long it takes to fill all the space available ;-))

WordPress has released the following Press Release about WordPress Backup Week:

WordPress is celebrating blog security and protection with WordPress Backup Week July 23-30.

WordPress, one of the most popular blogging and website management tools, is sponsoring WordPress Backup Week July 23-30. Step-by-step backup instructions will be available in the online manual, the WordPress Codex, and online in the WordPress Support Forum to help you through the process.

Your database contains every post, every comment and every link you have on your blog. If your database gets erased or corrupted, you stand to lose everything you have written. There are many reasons why this could happen and not all are things you can control. But what you can do is backup your data, after all, it is important isn’t it? Making backups is essential because problems inevitably occur and you need to be in a position to take action when disaster strikes. Spending a few minutes to make an easy, convenient backup of your database will allow you to spend even more time being creative and productive with your web site.

Backing up your WordPress database has never been easier with WordPress plugins which allow you control over how, what, and when you backup, even emailing your database backups to you – all pain free. Documentation is available to take you through the step-by-step process, as well, for backing up your WordPress site and database with cPanel, vDeck, DirectAdmin, Plesk, and others.

For your own protection and security, and peace of mind, join us in learning how to backup and protect our valuable data and writings during WordPress Backup Week. Consider using this Backup Week as an incentive to backup all your valuable documents and software, too.

Well what are you waiting for … get backing up.