The steps to backup a VM are:

1. Prepare the VM 
   su - virtkick, 
   
   virsh -c qemu:///system list
   
   virsh -c qemu:///system dumpxml MACHINE_NAME > /path/to/your/backup/directory/backup.xml
2. Create Backup
   virsh -c qemu:///system domblklist MACHINE_NAME
   
   mkdir -p /home/virtkick/snapshots/20160803/ virsh snapshot-create-as --domain 1_c72backuptest_732019dd-3479-4e59-8fbf-3f7e210f2ec1 NAME_OF_YOUR_BACKUP --diskspec vda,file=/home/virtkick/snapshots/20160803/1_c72backuptest_732019dd-3479-4e59-8fbf-3f7e210f2ec1-NAME_OF_YOUR_BACKUP.qcow2 --disk-only --atomic
3. Secure Backup
   rsync -hav --progress /home/virtkick/hdd/1_c72backuptest_d10af10c-cd41-4220-a175-0476eb4918c9.qcow2 backup@some-backup-server:/backup/safe/place
4. Perform active blockcommit 
   virsh blockcommit MACHINE_NAME vda --active --pivot --shallow --verbose