Data residency — and everything it involves — is quite a hot topic right now, with pushes for more data privacy by consumers and demands for better online security from internal compliance teams, IT departments, and government. We see a lot of these conversations happening in real-time when pitching to clients as a Webflow Enterprise agency.

Here’s the deal: Out of the box, Webflow manages hosting, deployment, CDNs, etc., which is great for most businesses. But for larger enterprises, companies want and need to have full control over where their site’s data lives. And that right there is a pretty big reason why Edgar Allan developed Wes. 

What’s Wes? In a nutshell, it’s an exclusive Webflow Enterprise solution we created to enhance Webflow’s already robust offering and facilitate our clients' data residency.

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First, a quick primer on data residency.

To back up a moment, the term “data residency” is a fancy way of saying that a site’s data will live on a server in a specific location, whether for compliance or security reasons. This is the area in which Wes really shines. It gives enterprise-level companies the agency to publish their site to a specific server, or multiple servers, across numerous destinations really easily. 

Looking for a more in-depth and technical answer? Check out this article on everything you need to know about data residency.  

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Are data residency and GDPR the same thing?

Nope!

Data residency is the idea that files will be hosted in a specific location. GDPR, on the other hand, is the mandate that stipulates what kind of data needs to be hosted where. GDPR also gives businesses guidelines around what information they can keep, how long they can keep it, and what data they need to alert users about. 

In a nutshell, GDPR refers to what you need to do with your data. Data residency speaks to how you’re going to do it. 

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Why is data residency important for businesses?

There are various reasons why you should care about data residency. At its core, it all comes down to complying with directives from legal teams, IT departments, or governments. The reasons behind these directives also vary. 

Sometimes, it’s for security reasons, like tracking IP addresses that could access customer data. At other times, it’s because it’s a government-mandated data protection law, think GDPR or the CCPA. 

Here’s a quick-fire list of other reasons why data residency is important:

• Data security and privacy
• Performance and accessibility
• Risk mitigation and business continuity

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How does Wes help make achieving data residency easier?

Here’s the long and short of it: Server-side rendering and publishing sites to remote locations with Webflow wouldn’t be possible without Wes.

Right now, you can export the HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and images that make up your site from Webflow, but that leaves your content behind. Wes looks at the rendering of a Webflow site holistically and completely and (here’s the kicker) gives you the power to host it anywhere. 

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What are the benefits of using Wes to achieve data residency?

There’s one massive one: overcoming objections from your IT or legal teams. 

As a Webflow Enterprise Partner, we often face roadblocks around privacy, security, and data residency when bringing Webflow into a business’s tech stack. Especially if that business collects, processes, or stores sensitive and personal information, like organizations in the finance and healthcare industries (among others).

Some key players are really into Webflow, but their legal and IT departments have reservations, so it’s up to us and the internal team who are on board to do a little convincing. This is where Wes comes into the picture. 

We introduce Wes as a tool that provides all the authoring capabilities companies need, along with immense control over publishing and hosting. It’s a really bright line that answers and overcomes many of the “what about” questions that come up before a pitch is won and a project gets underway.

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That’s all great, but what else is Wes good for?

This is kind of like asking, “What’s a screwdriver good for?” After all, screwdrivers serve a variety of functions, from DIY to puncturing an enemy’s tires. (That was a joke. Please don’t try this at home.)

Wes is a little like a screwdriver in this way. It has a lot of use cases. 

We developed Wes to solve multiple problems and extend Webflow’s functionality. More than just GDPR compliance software, Wes helps streamline the deployment process, offering version control, per-page publishing, and much more. 

Check out Wes for more details or watch our video to get started.

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