Data Export (Weekly/Monthly Export): Salesforce’s built-in tool to get a complete backup of your data. You can run it manually or schedule it. For instance, Enterprise and above editions can schedule a weekly export of all data. This generates a set of CSV files (usually zipped) for every object in your org. You can do this via Setup -> Data Export. You can choose include attachments and documents as well. Salesforce will let you schedule it and then each week you receive an email when the backup is ready for download. (If not scheduled, you can still initiate an export manually once a week.) Limitations: Weekly is the most frequent (or monthly for some editions)​, so if you need daily backups, you’ll need to supplement with other methods. Also, the restore is manual (you’d have to import the CSVs). Despite that, this is a must-have baseline – ensure the weekly export is enabled and someone is downloading and storing those files. They form a comprehensive safety net.

Reports and manual exports: For specific slices of data, you can use Salesforce reports to export data as needed. For example, an admin might run a report on “All FieldKo Tasks completed this month” and export to Excel/CSV. This is more ad-hoc and not suitable for a full backup, but useful for targeted backups (and user-friendly for non-admins). You can also schedule reports to be emailed (as discussed earlier) – however, remember the row limits (max ~2,000 rows in emailed content, or ~15,000 in attachments)​. So reports are fine for backing up small objects or subsets, but not for entire large objects.

Data Loader exports: Using the Data Loader, you can script regular exports of certain objects. For example, you might nightly export all new Survey__c records. This requires more work to set up (and someplace to store the results), but gives you flexibility in frequency (daily, etc.) and content. Essentially, you’d be maintaining your own backup pipeline.

Salesforce Backup & Restore (native service): In 2021, Salesforce introduced a paid add-on for automated backup and restore. If your organization has purchased that, it provides policy-based daily backups within Salesforce’s infrastructure and allows on-demand restore of records. This is a relatively new (and premium) feature.

OwnBackup: A well-known Salesforce backup service. It backs up Salesforce data (and metadata) daily (or more often) to their secure cloud storage. It has a user interface to compare backups and restore records or entire objects with a few clicks.

Spanning Backup: Another leading solution (by Dell). It performs daily automatic backups of Salesforce data/metadata and allows self-service restore. Spanning is known for being simple to set up via AppExchange and runs seamlessly in the background​.

Automated daily (or even multiple times per day) backups without you writing scripts.

Storage outside Salesforce – e.g., OwnBackup stores backups in their AWS storage. This is good because if something catastrophic happened to your Salesforce data, your backup lives independently.

One-click restore – they can restore data hierarchies, maintain lookup relationships, etc., much more easily than manual CSV imports. This is extremely useful if, say, someone accidentally deletes 1000 Visit records – a backup tool could reinsert them and link them back to their Accounts in minutes.

Backup of attachments, chatter, etc.: Many tools also backup files, Content, Knowledge, etc., which the weekly export would also include but manual processes might overlook.

If FieldKo is heavily used daily (e.g., field reps logging visits and surveys every day), a daily backup is ideal. This limits potential data loss to <24 hours.

If updates are less frequent, or perhaps you have weekly cycles, a weekly backup might suffice.

At minimum, always do the Salesforce Weekly Export (since it’s easy and in platform). Then consider augmenting with daily exports of the most important objects (perhaps via Data Loader CLI or a third-party tool).

Remember, the more frequent, the more storage and management of backup files, so it’s a trade-off.

Salesforce doesn’t retain your weekly exports on their server indefinitely – you have to download them within a certain time. So retention is up to you once downloaded.

A common practice is to keep rolling 3 months of backups and delete older ones. Some organisations keep even longer, like 6 months or 1 year, especially if storage is cheap. The FieldKo data likely changes often, so having a long history may help if someone only notices an issue much later.

Why 13 months? Some recommend 13 months of backups​ so you have a buffer beyond a year (covering seasonality or year-end snapshots). This can be useful for compliance (financial or audit data often is kept for a year+). It’s ultimately up to your company policy and any regulations (for example, if FieldKo is used in a regulated industry, you might need x years of data archived).

Make sure old backup files are securely disposed of if they contain sensitive data and you no longer need them.

Use a secure, reliable storage medium. If you’re downloading zip files from Weekly Export, store them on a company-approved cloud storage or an on-prem server that is backed up. Don’t just leave them on an individual’s laptop.

Control access to backup files – they often contain all your customer info which is sensitive. Limit to admins or IT team.

Encrypt backups at rest if possible, or use encrypted storage.

Weekly full export via Salesforce (with all objects and attachments) – download and store safely, keep last N exports.

Daily incremental export of key objects via Data Loader CLI – for instance, export all records created or modified that day, append to a backup database or file. (This is optional, but some do it for an extra layer).

Third-party daily backup – if budget allows, use OwnBackup or Spanning to automatically do daily full backups. This greatly simplifies the process and provides quick restore if needed.

Regular review: Check the backup logs/emails to ensure backups ran successfully. Salesforce will email if a weekly export fails, and tools will alert on errors.

Update strategy as FieldKo evolves: If new objects are added (say FieldKo introduces a new module with a new custom object), add those to the backup plan.