As customers become more dependent on IT, their business risks increase from disruptions caused by catastrophic weather, national emergencies, civil unrest, malicious attacks and poor IT management. According to industry research, 93 percent of companies that lose their data for 10 days or more due to a disaster file for bankruptcy.

Another telling statistic: 60 percent of SMBs consider data backup and restore to be one of their top two IT priorities. This growing awareness about the need to lessen risk with business continuity and disaster recovery and (BCDR) solutions is creating an opening for solution providers. Because many SMB customers aren’t prepared for a server crashing, much less for a major business interruption, there’s a huge opportunity to provide education about the risks, present a plan for guarding against them, sell the needed solutions, and deliver services at every step along the way. In the end, BCDR solutions can help you become a trusted partner that generates a steady revenue stream from each customer.

Sound daunting? It shouldn’t, according to Chris Squier, technology solutions engineer for security at Ingram Micro. “Many solution providers may not realize how much business-continuity expertise they already have,” Squier says. “If they’re selling solutions such as anti-malware and VPNs for security, SANs and NAS for storage, and content management to secure documents, they already have the impetus for a business-continuity practice. They’re just not presenting it that way.”

Managed services is another area with a strong businesscontinuity component, says Katy Farney, director of global channel sales at Lantronix. “Many managed services providers are using Lantronix’s SecureLinx Secure Console Servers (SCS) for remote troubleshooting and management of multiple SMB customers from a central location,” Farney says. Such devices are also sold to datacenter managers for remote management in case of a power or systems outage.

Planning for Business Continuity
For solution providers, the linchpin of business continuity is a plan for protecting data and recovering it if it is lost. Generally this breaks down into three areas:

• Availability solutions keep IT running and guard against power outages, system glitches, component failures and a host of security threats.
• Recovery solutions help restore operations after an outage. Proactive plans assess risk and specify recovery processes.
• Backup and restore solutions prioritize backup and restore processes based on data type and criticality.

Getting Started
To start a formal business-continuity practice, Squier recommends devising a solution centered on your competencies in networking, storage, systems or security, and adding complementary services such as business-continuity evaluation, disaster-recovery planning and vulnerability assessment. “You don’t have to offer everything at once,” he says. “By starting small, you can build a successful practice one step at a time.”

If you’d like to learn more, contact Ingram Micro. The distributor offers two-day boot camps for BCDR sales and technical solutions training. (The next one is scheduled for July 18-19, 2007 in Buffalo, N.Y.) Pre-and post-sales tech support covers multiple manufacturers and ISVs. And Ingram Micro’s sales representatives, business development managers and engineers are available for strategy sessions on maximizing the BCDR opportunity.

For More Information
For boot camp details, Ingram Micro's customers can contact Huy Nguyen, security solutions marketing manager, at huy.nguyen@ingrammicro.com or (714) 566-1000, ext. 22443. General information is available at www.ingrammicro.com/businesscontinuity after logging in, or by calling the Security Help Desk at (800) 445-5066, ext. 76102.