Safeguard your Salesforce CRM data and prevent any potential data loss through the use of an independent backup cloud.
Highlights
- Seamlessly back up all of your most important Salesforce data, be it Object records, Files, or Attachments.
- Avoid downtime with the ability to rapidly restore affected records with just a few clicks.
- Easily comply with privacy, data retention, and manipulation regulations.
- Effortlessly monitor your backup or recovery status, connector statistics, as well as audit details.
Maintaining business continuity is key for any application, even in the event of human error. With Salesforce Admins or even users having the possibility to modify or delete large amounts of data, these operations might lead to as much as 70% of data loss situations. Ensuring your Salesforce data is available, regardless of what happens in the actual CRM on a daily basis, must be considered as part of your overall strategy.
Keepit is an end-to-end backup and recovery solution, which offers an enhanced security layer through the use of a vendor-agnostic private cloud dedicated to SaaS application data protection. As an universal service for multiple SaaS applications, Keepit has seven individual data center regions across the globe with the sole focus of protecting enterprise data, and ensuring immutability at all times. All data centers– in fact, Keepit’s entire operations– are managed under ISO 27001.
This in-depth review will showcase Keepit’s main features, ideal use cases, and setup effort, as well as how fast your users can adopt this solution.
Features
From a backup perspective, Keepit offers unlimited storage for all of your Salesforce data, regardless of its type. As data storage volumes are not a problem with this product, let’s take a closer look at the available functionality.
Data Backup
Once you’re logged into Keepit’s browser application, you will be able to add the org(s) you want to back up in the Connectors tab. Once the connection is established with an admin’s user credentials, the backup is started automatically.
While ad-hoc backups can also be triggered, there is a daily backup scheduled to happen, helping to ensure you always have the latest version of your data in the Keepit cloud.
Connector Configuration
Once a connector is established, you can go back and make updates to its configuration if needed. This includes name, API requests percentage, user access, and more.
One of the available options is Snapshot Retention, and while the retention period initially defaults to one year, you can choose to limit it to as little as a month or raise it up to 99 years.
Backed Up Items
Following the initial backup being completed, the subsequent backups are incremental, meaning that all changes to existing records, new records, or deletions will be captured. By clicking on the Connector of your choice, you will be able to see the three categories that have been backed up: Attachments, Files, and Objects.
As you will see below, you can drill down to record level and also preview the field data on the same page. This same behavior is maintained for Attachments and Files, meaning that you can navigate to them, and actually view the entire content of the document or image, for example.
If you decide to preview any of the records, you will also have quite a few options to choose from. Directly on the page, you can download, view previous versions, or even directly restore the record to a target environment of your choice. Similar to how Contacts, Accounts or other objects can be found and restored, with KeepIt you can do the same even for a document.
Restore Wizard
The decision to have all of your Salesforce data securely backed up will come to good use when records are mistakenly changed or deleted directly in your production environment. The possibility to quickly restore one or multiple records to their previous state is something Keepit does well, as the entire process is not only intuitive but also very simple. Once you access the Restore Wizard from the Connector, firstly you need to choose the location the data will be sent to: either the same location, a production environment, or a sandbox.
Secondly, you will have to select a snapshot. While there is the automated daily backup you can choose from, if you started any backups manually then they will also be available for selection here.
Following the snapshot choice, you will also have to make a decision about the selection method. You have the option of restoring the full org, uploading a CSV with a list of items to be restored, or manually selecting records (which is the most used option for targeted restore).
From now on, it’s all about choosing the Objects and records to be restored. In the example below, we will restore one Contact – but you can also select any other record(s). While the metadata itself cannot be directly restored, it is captured to facilitate the restoration of records (and their related records if you choose to, for example master-detail relationships).
Understand Data Changes
Within the Keepit platform there is also a mechanism to determine what changes have happened to your data in the latest snapshot compared to previous ones.
If you don’t already know which record(s) you would like to restore, you can compare any two snapshots to further analyze changes on any of your records.
For example, after clicking through the Connector and Objects, you can swiftly filter exactly what you’re looking for. In this case, that would be Modified data, but you can choose any of the other available filters or directly search for what you’re looking for. When comparing two snapshots you can quickly detect data loss, spot deleted files and start the restore process, or even track other records which have been added, removed or remain unchanged.
If you find a record that you would like to quickly restore, you can access the Restore Wizard directly and start the restore job from the list. Alternatively, you can download the record as well.
Sandbox Seeding and Data Anonymization
When we started the Restore job above, the first option was to select the target Salesforce org. One of the available options was a Sandbox, which is how sandbox seeding is achieved.
After authenticating in the sandbox of your choice, you can go through the exact same steps as a Restore job: choosing the Objects and individual records, as well as if related records should be restored.
While anonymization is not something you would generally use while restoring to a production org (even though you can with Keepit) it is best practice to do so for sandboxes to avoid any personal information or real email addresses. As an additional option, you can choose individual fields to restore as well as anonymize when possible – Keepit will do the rest!
Easily Monitor Keepit Activities in Job Monitor
Since there is a possibility to have multiple connectors for either various Salesforce orgs or different applications, knowing how the backup or restore jobs perform and what their status is can be a helpful piece of information.
On top of this, for each of the jobs you can access a more detailed report in order to know exactly the number of records added, removed, or even skipped.
As well as the Job Monitor, the Monitoring tab will bring even more insight to the table. At a glance, you will be able to analyze how the data volumes fluctuate, then action accordingly in case of any unexpected spikes.
To go a step further when it comes to knowing exactly what is going on with your Connectors, the Audit log provides detailed information about a variety of user actions – such as backups being manually started or even just clicking on one of the Connectors.
Right to be Forgotten Label
Part of complying with local data laws is having the mechanism to do so. With the Right To Be Forgotten (RTBF) Label, Keepit serves the purpose of tagging those records which, in accordance with GDPR, cannot be recovered in any way, shape or form – be it through restoring to the source organization or a download.
Any record can be assigned this label from the three dot menu at the end of the row on the right hand side. Note that it is recommended to add a comment every time in order to know exactly the reason behind the label. Once assigned, will the record become inaccessible individually, and if it ever becomes part of a larger restore job, it will still fail.
Make sure to check out all the considerations about the RTBF Label here.
Roadmap
Keepit is dedicated to continuous improvements of their backup and recovery solution for Salesforce. In Summer ‘24, they will provide a Managed Package option as well, allowing Salesforce Admins and Developers to perform backup and recovery services without having to leave their Salesforce environment. This is sure to make an already fast process, even more seamless!
Metadata is the backbone of any Salesforce Environment. This being said, the ability to backup and restore all your Metadata is crucial to business continuity. This summer, Keepit will provide customers with the option to perform a full Metadata backup and recovery job in any environment. This will be a big win for customers looking to ensure they are fully covered if disaster were to strike.
As well as the Job Monitor, the Monitoring tab will bring even more insight to the table. At a glance, you will be able to analyze how the data volumes fluctuate, then action accordingly in case of any unexpected spikes.
The monitoring dashboard will be updated to trigger alerts by detecting data anomalies in the changes between your snapshots. This will allow you to easily spot any significant changes in your Salesforce data and rapidly take further action. Anomaly Detection will be combined with the Salesforce Data Changes view, so you can quickly see where and what was changed in your environment causing the anomaly. This new feature is currently in preview with selected customers and will be generally available later in 2024.
Use Cases
Security and compliance are ingrained in the Keepit infrastructure, and this becomes apparent right from the get-go. Being fully independent, your data will not be stored in any third-party cloud at any time, and Keepit doesn’t have any data subprocessors..
As mentioned above when exploring the RTBF Label, local regulations are a significant conversation nowadays, with GDPR being only one example across the European Union. Another factor and use case to consider when it comes to a backup and restore tool is immutability – this is something that Keepit does really well.
Four copies of your data in its exact form are kept at all times, in two different data centers. This is a significant advantage of their independent cloud, as it ensures that potential data loss risks are mitigated, making the recovery process a breeze for any of the SaaS applications you choose to back up.
In addition to the ‘peace of mind’ that having multiple copies of your data brings, Keepit also offers the option to share information about any of the backed-up records directly through a shared link. Data protection also comes into play within this functionality, as you can set either a password, expiry date, or both.
The link can be accessed by anyone, regardless if they have a Keepit seat, are a Salesforce user, or neither. If you decide to create and share a shared link from the latest snapshot, the data will always be displayed, even if the record is updated in the meantime. Additionally, as you can see below, a password as well as an expiration date can be set.
Impact
The impact on your organization is sure to be noticed sooner rather than later, considering the ‘peace of mind’ a backup solution offers. Additionally, Keepit is not only fast and simple to use, but it also ensures top quality data security at a cost that will not break the bank.
Setup
The setup aspect of the tool is not only straightforward but also intuitive and only takes a few minutes to set up and start the first backup – even without guidance. Once you have access to your tenant, it’s a matter of creating the connector (in this case to Salesforce) and deciding to back up either a sandbox or production org.
While for the initial backup, it is recommended to allow a higher API usage, you can always control it after the connector is established. Additionally, at each individual connector level, you can update the access, change the data retention timeframe, and switch the credentials.
Support
While Keepit does offer written documentation to help you get started in no time, if you have particular questions you can always reach out to their support team. This can be done directly from your Keepit tenant by opening a support ticket, or through the chat functionality in the help portal.
Either way, you choose to reach out, you can also add attachments (such as screenshots) to your request.
Pricing
Keepit stays true to their claim of “no hidden costs” with all the pricing details, for any application, available directly on their website. Starting at $2.95 / seat / month, there are three plans to choose from, depending on your needs and size of your organization. Keep in mind that there are no extra charges for archiving or sandbox seeding, and that all plans include unlimited storage.
A full breakdown of the functionality included with each of the pricing tiers can be found here.
To request a detailed pricing offer, feel free to submit this form and the Keepit team will get back to you shortly.
Summary
All in all, Keepit could become your company’s go-to backup and recovery tool for Salesforce, allowing you to not only safeguard all of your data but also have it readily available to restore, share, or permanently forget. The platform’s simplicity and ease of use alongside the independent cloud are sure to supercharge your backup and recovery strategy long term.
If you would like to discover how seamless the backup and recovery process can be in your scenarios for Salesforce, or for one of the other multiple SaaS applications that Keepit supports, be sure to request a demo.