"I'll back it up later" is how most people learn about backups the hard way. Automating it removes the human error entirely.
Schedule, don't remember – Cron jobs (or your host's built-in backup scheduler) running daily/weekly, not manual backups you have to remember to run.
Store off-server – A backup on the same server it's protecting doesn't help if that server fails entirely; push backups to separate storage (S3, another server, a backup service).
Actually test a restore – A backup you've never restored from is a backup you don't actually know works.
Keep multiple generations – Not just the latest backup, but several recent ones, in case corruption isn't noticed immediately.
Encrypt sensitive backups – Especially if they're stored on third-party services.
What's your current backup setup, and have you actually tested restoring from it?
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