Data retention policy: Best Practices and Key Elements I Vaultastic

What is a Data Retention Policy?

A data retention policy also called a company retention policy, is a documented guideline on how to store, classify, and organize data.

It also demarcates the rules and sets the procedure to dispose of data when no longer in need.

This policy comes in handy to prevent unnecessary data build-up, which, in turn, helps save costs.

Businesses use data to amp up their marketing initiatives. Data can also be used to improve customer experience. Businesses increasingly use data to power artificial intelligence(AI) decision-making.

Great-quality data has never been as highly sought-after as now. A data retention policy can help you streamline this data and give your organization an edge in the marketplace.

Let's see how.

Key parts of a Data Retention Policy

Besides playing a key role in marketing and operational activities, data retention helps businesses fulfill regulatory and compliance norms.

Organizations of all sizes and structures are taking a closer look at their data retention and disposal policy.

These are the critical elements in a data retention policy:

Nature of the data to be stored

Not all data is useful to all businesses. It is important to define what the cloud ingests, and what it must reject as futile.

Format of storing data

This must define the script in which the data needs to be stored.

Timeline of data retention

Long-term data retention is necessary to meet regulatory compliance. Holding onto data for longer than necessary causes data build-up and increased storage costs.

Disposal procedure

Here, you would define the method for data disposal and enlist authorized personnel who can influence the task.

Remedial mechanism (in case of breach or theft, or policy violation)

Having a remedial process ensures the speedy resolution of problems as and when they arise.

Why do businesses need a Data Retention Policy?

In modern-day decision-making, businesses use data to track consumer behavior, trends, and sales patterns to optimize processes. Data analysis also assists in improving customer experience. A data retention policy, in its entirety, helps you do much more.

These are the functions it serves:

Ensuring legal and regulatory compliance

Fulfill data protection obligations set by national and state law.

Implementing marketing initiatives

Data brings precision to marketing initiatives.

Fortifying financial records and litigation protection

Mistakes in data management can cost billions in litigation damages.

Improving customer experience

Data allows you to curtail fraudulent transactions.

Why is Data Retention so challenging

Most businesses suffer due to the lack of a data retention policy, as data has an intrinsic habit of scaling rapidly and often unannounced. Without a proper guideline, your efforts are directed towards filling gaps that a simple policy could've plugged.

An organization faces these common challenges in long-term data retention:

Managing the volume of data

Rapidly growing organizations can be smothered by a colossal increase in data over a short period. Ever-changing policies garnered by the changing landscape of set policies in personnel records, taxes, audits, and cybersecurity, to name a few, tend to overwhelm employees in charge of retention.

Classifying the data types

Mastering the art of differentiating what is helpful from what isn't can make or break your data management. Categorizing records based on business function, codes, and retention periods can be time-consuming.

Data Retention and Disposal Policy

The real uphill task starts with data disposal that keeps sensitive information secure as sometimes retention policies on specific categories stray toward gray areas.

Data retention policy made easy with Vaultastic

The vastness of Vaultastic’s Data Management solutions allows you to preserve data most efficiently, and create a customized backup and retention policy.

You can quickly and surely achieve your data management software, which includes an archival and data retention tool.

Vaultastic also optimizes data storage, allowing storage on different tiers depending on usage. It includes source-side data deduplication so that only one version of each data is transmitted to the cloud.

Automated archives with central storage, cost-effective aspect, and E-discovery tools are just a few of the main features within Vaultastic that ensure data retention best practices are enabled. To know more, visit here.

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A data retention policy enriches your data management strategic initiatives.