Eco hosting & wordpress maintenance

The nature of the internet means that your website’s security is paramount. Cybercriminals, scammers, hackers are an increasing problem, and your website needs to be protected. Just as your computer should have antivirus/malware software and be kept updated, the same applies to your website.

Website maintenance work is not like insurance. It’s like servicing, similar to how you would service a vehicle regularly. It is difficult to rectify a situation once a problem occurs if no servicing has been done. It pro-actively prevents and prepares for any possible attacks and problems and either stops them happening or allows for restoration via backups.

Because of the volume of hacking attacks, more frequent security upgrades are needed for the core system, theme, and plugins. In the past, this wasn’t as critical with a simple static site. Modern dynamic websites which allow more functions, such as updating using a content management system (like wordPress), or running an online shop, require maintenance.

And with GDPR / Privacy controls, your website has to have security features such as an SSL certificate as standard now and also to protect any information your users submit to you, especially if you sell online.

These upgrades and changes often lead to a degree of reworking the site. They ensure that it continues to work in the latest browsers, plus all modern devices like new phones and tablets. The software upgrades also ensure that your site will continue to work with web browser versions not even released yet.

Over the years we have invested considerably in the required hardware and software such as security plugins, good hosting, reliable themes and plugins, backup systems both on the server and also remote backups should the server get infected.

A maintenance agreement will use this software to ensure that your site continues to be safe for your customers to visit as well as secure & fully functional even as web standards continue to change.

When we start building your development site we set this up on a test server and work on this until the site is ready and then we move this to the live site.

If after 3 months of setting up the test site, the website has not moved to live site due to delays from client side, we will implement our monthly WordPress Maintenance Package.

This is because we still pay for space on our server and need to keep plugins, WordPress and theme updated on a weekly basis in order to keep the website working and secure and take regular backups.

Maintenance services are only available if we provide the hosting service. We do not provide maintenance on sites that are not hosted by us as the maintenance services mean we need full control over server facilities such as database backups, PHP versions and SSL certificates. Plus it’s not an environment we are familiar with if things go wrong.

This technical maintenance includes:

• Daily or weekly backups using our remote paid-for tool as well as daily backups on the server.
• WordPress core website kept up-to-date with security updates.
• Login Security – Two Factor Authentication plugin and setup if required.
• Wordfence Security – including monitoring of vulnerable plugins or security risks so we can do updates immediately.
• Restoration of site to latest backup in case of technical failure or hack attack.
• Plug-in security updates.
• Theme updates.
• Check of pages and site functions after updates done.
• Server security / PHP version maintenance – updates and testing.
• Optimising database using our remote tool – this covers removing revisions and spams comments only.

There are often updates up to 3 times a week – unlike years ago when it was a few times a month – things move a lot faster now in this day and age. If you see there are updates not done in the backend, it is often because I am waiting for more stable and non-buggy versions to be available and for wordpress, themes and plugins to be compatible otherwise doing an update could break the site.

• Optimising performance and speed – over time, sites tend to naturally build up bloat and slow down. This can be due to a number of factors such as upgrades and updates getting bigger and more complex, lots of content being added to the site, large unoptimised images being added, drafts and unused plugins being left on the site and more. If you required an audit and work done to optimise the site, this can be quoted for separately.
• Enquiry systems and emails – these must be checked regularly by yourself. You receive the submitted emails which we don’t have access to.
• Issues with your clients submitting something like a form, event or having payment issues – this often needs looking into in more detail and we require time to test debugging and as much details from your client and the problem they are having – often we don’t get this detail and are unable to try replicate the issue. In the past it has often been down to something as simple as someone not putting in a correct email address, or problem with a 3rd party tool such as email marketing services or a bad internet service. So in these cases, we would have to charge for the time to look into this.
• Any content changes, further additions, styling and development – our maintenance agreement is for mentioned technical services only and does not include updating the content or doing any further development and styling on the website. If you want to have me help you update text information, SEO, photos, blogs, social media, add pages, change menus, and anything further on your website this can be quoted for separately.
• An update or change that you do that goes wrong – if you do an update, make changes to the site or use your own plugin and something goes wrong and we need to fix anything. Please always check with us if you or your SEO person or other wants to add plugins etc as well. We cannot be held responsible if things go wrong and this can impact on our maintenance and compatibility with other plugins.
• Fixing a site when it has been compromised or hacked – we cannot fully guarantee the site from being compromised or hacked. We do our utmost to secure the site and keep things updated to close security loopholes and keep backups in case we need to restore a site. There will be a cost involved for this situation as it can involve outsourcing to get it cleaned from malware. We also recommend that if you are making edits to the site that you use very secure passwords, do not use public wifi, and have protection or anti-virus software on your computer. Things like this rarely occur but we need to make you aware.

If you are unsure if it is included or not I can let you know before I do the work.

We are delighted to be able to offer you a very competitive rate – very reasonable in comparison with many around PLUS you get hosting included!  This can be paid monthly, or a year in advance. This agreement may be terminated at any time, and the ownership of the website is always retained by you, during and after the agreement ends.

Whilst we highly recommend you take up this maintenance agreement, you are not being forced to have it in any way. However, you do need to confirm what your choice is and stick to the agreement.

If you do not choose to have a maintenance agreement, and choose one of our “hosting only” plans, you will be responsible for taking any backups and performing security/feature updates yourself, or arranging for another website developer to do so.

If, for example, there are any hacking attacks, or if the site stops working after an update, or if you somehow break it when editing it yourself, we will attempt to restore the site from the backups you have taken or from our server if you host with us (they are not hourly though so we can’t always do a very recent backup and you may lose some changes). However there are no guarantees that we will be able to restore the site in a timely fashion, or back to its original state. Also any changes done between the last working backup and the time you wish to restore it will be lost.

Any time taken, whether successful or not, will be charged at our normal hourly rate of £45. The estimated time could be anything from a few hours to a day, depending on what needs fixing and finding a workable backup.