What is Data Deduplication? A Plain-English Guide

As a marketer, you likely deal with data in some form on a regular basis. So, how is data deduplication relevant to you?

With so much critical information saved on our computer systems, we've learned to backup data regularly — including our email inboxes, Word documents, photos, and entire folders of old work. It's typically a ton of data.

Since we usually backup and save our data on auto-pilot, we might not realize just how much has been re-copied and re-saved. Over time, our data storage becomes unnecessarily burdened with redundant copies of data, costing money as data requirements grow and processing time slows down. This is where data deduplication comes in.

What is data deduplication?

Data deduplication is the process of deleting redundant copies of data in order to reduce processing time for a software system. Every time you backup your software system, you're copying and storing large data sets. This requires an unmanageably large amount of data storage. Data deduplication optimizes your data storage by ensuring only one unique instance of data is copied and stored.

Andrew Le, an IT Helpdesk Technician at HubSpot, further explains the importance of data deduplication for a business looking to grow — "[Data deduplication] really improves scaling and efficiency when pulling data from one source. If you have lots of the same data in different spaces, your entire system can be slowed down."

So, you might be wondering, "How does data deduplication actually work?" Let's dive into it.

How does data deduplication work?

The data deduplication process might seem intimidating, but it's actually simpler than it sounds. You can use data deduplication software when you backup your computer. Additionally, some marketing automation software, like HubSpot, might have a deduplication feature to keep track of your marketing contacts.

To ensure you're optimizing your data backup storage, here’s a list of the best data deduplication software you can use to minimize unnecessary data copies.

Data Deduplication Software

1. HubSpot's Deduplication Feature

Best for: Any business.

If you use HubSpot's CRM to manage your contacts, you'll be impressed to find out you can also use HubSpot's machine learning-powered deduplication feature to keep your contact database clean. HubSpot contacts can be deduplicated by a user token set with a cookie in their web browser or email address — additionally, contacts, companies, deals, and tickets can be deduplicated using a unique object ID.

2. Dedupely

Best for: A dedicated deduplication platform that integrates with your CRM.

Dedupely finds and merges duplicate data automatically, saving you time and headaches and improving trust and alignment across your company.

If your company stores a lot of data, it's important to begin the data deduplication process. By using software, you can simply automate this process.

3. Barracuda Backup Deduplication

Best for: Users of Barracuda security solutions.

With a 9.1 user rating out of 10 on TrustRadius, Barracuda Backup is a good option, offering a robust, secure, fully-integrated data deduplication solution. Their tool can help your business reduce bandwidth requirements and backup costs. Additionally, Barracuda is a good option if your business needs to protect multiple sites, since its cloud storage technology helps distributed networks stay protected.

4. Avamar

Best for: Remote-work companies and enterprises.

Avamar, a solution from Dell EMC, provides variable-length deduplication, which reduces backup time by only storing unique daily changes while simultaneously maintaining daily backups. Avamar is an efficient, secure option and is particularly useful for virtual environments, remote offices, and enterprise applications.

5. HPE StoreOnce

Best for: Any business.

HPE StoreOnce, a solution from Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, offers disk-based backup, deduplication, and secure long-term data storage. Their deduplication software is equipped for virtual backup machines in small remote offices, and equally capable of handling high-performance dedicated applications for larger businesses. Ultimately, this is an impressive tool to help you keep your data secure and efficient as you scale-up.

6. Exagrid EX Series

Best for: Faster, more efficient backups.

Exagrid implements a highly efficient approach to data deduplication that allows six times the backup performance, and up to 20 times the restore and VM boot performance. With Exagrid, you can backup your data straight onto a disk without inline deduplication processing, enabling a shorter backup window.

7. Insycle

Best for: A full data storage and automation solution.

One of G2's high-performers and a HubSpot App Partner, Insycle is a complete customer data management solution that makes it simple for companies to manage, automate, and maintain clean customer databases. It drives efficiency, betters reporting, aligns teams, and improves trust in data.

Cut down on excess data with data deduplication.

Don’t get me wrong, data backups are crucial to keep your company’s assets safe. However, if unmoinitored, automatic backups can lead to bloated storage and poor performance from your servers. Luckily, it’s easy to deduplicate excess data with the right tools to keep your software and business running smoothly.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in April 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.