5 reasons why WordPress maintenance makes sense

Nowa­days it is get­ting easier and easier to crea­te a web­site. Espe­ci­al­ly con­tent manage­ment sys­tems like Word­Press make this pos­si­ble. Unfort­u­na­te­ly, despi­te ever­y­thing, the­re are some things you have to keep in mind with a web­site. Given this, it makes sen­se to get a pro­fes­sio­nal main­ten­an­ce packa­ge for litt­le money. With this post, I want to give you a few reasons why it makes sen­se to sign a main­ten­an­ce con­tract.

Backups just in case #

I, as a deve­lo­per, have lear­ned one thing quick­ly — a regu­lar back­up saves you money, time and most of all ner­ves. Most cli­ents I talk to about Word­Press main­ten­an­ce think that back­up only ever comes into play when a web­site has been hacked. But this is not the case. Just the other day we recei­ved a request to res­to­re a web­site becau­se of pro­blems with the instal­la­ti­on of an update. Wit­hout a back­up, a res­to­re is often a major under­ta­king for online stores and mul­­ti-sites.

You can get excel­lent main­ten­an­ce for as litt­le as 29 € / month. Let’s just compa­re the cost of Word­Press main­ten­an­ce:

With the cost of a Word­Press reco­very:

It must be said, howe­ver, that the 8 hours are empi­ri­cal values. Depen­ding on the error, the effort may vary. Howe­ver, with a reco­very, the cost would be one-time — with main­ten­an­ce, you’­re cover­ed for the enti­re year at €348.

Note: You should make sure that the data is stored on a ser­ver in the EU (DSGVO). Other­wi­se, you can get into legal trou­ble here. Espe­ci­al­ly with main­ten­an­ce con­tracts that spe­ci­fy cloud sto­rage, you should be careful. If you want to be on the safe side, you are wel­co­me to sign a main­ten­an­ce con­tract with us. Our back­ups are all stored on a ser­ver in Ger­ma­ny.

Fewer compatibility problems thanks to regular updates #

A huge time saver are the updates per­for­med in a main­ten­an­ce. This ensu­res that your web­site always has access to the latest fea­tures. Fur­ther­mo­re, updating plug-ins, the­me and Word­Press will impro­ve the per­for­mance of your web­site.

I always recom­mend to install the updates in a month­ly inter­val. This results in com­pa­ti­bi­li­ty pro­blems in the fewest cases. It also has the advan­ta­ge that secu­ri­ty gaps are clo­sed prompt­ly.

Unfort­u­na­te­ly, doing wit­hout updates altog­e­ther to keep the web­site run­ning is not a solu­ti­on eit­her. This is evi­dent right now as many hos­ters are start­ing to dis­con­ti­nue sup­port for old PHP ver­si­ons (< PHP 8).

Your website will be more secure than Fort Knox #

That with a Word­Press main­ten­an­ce through regu­lar updates secu­ri­ty gaps are clo­sed, I had alre­a­dy men­tio­ned. But, of cour­se, you can do much more. If you do not have your own ser­ver, it is a good idea to install a WAF.

What is a WAF ? The abbre­via­ti­on WAF stands for Web Appli­ca­ti­on Fire­wall. So, in short, it is a fire­wall, for your web­site. Many main­ten­an­ce packa­ges include a WAF — but the­re are dif­fe­ren­ces here, too, and of cour­se you always have to make sure that ever­y­thing is DSGVO-com­­pli­­ant.

A fire­wall must be che­cked and updated regu­lar­ly. The rules also need to be adapt­ed. Good main­ten­an­ce con­tracts con­tain a solu­ti­on for this. Fur­ther­mo­re, a WAF also moni­tors the log-in of Word­Press and Woo­Com­mer­ce and blocks IP addres­ses auto­ma­ti­cal­ly. This makes bru­te force attacks more dif­fi­cult.

During main­ten­an­ce, the indi­vi­du­al plug-in, Word­Press and the­me ver­si­ons are also che­cked against known secu­ri­ty vul­nerabi­li­ties. As soon as a secu­ri­ty vul­nerabi­li­ty is detec­ted, an update is appli­ed. This pre­vents hackers and bots from acces­sing your cus­to­mers’ sen­si­ti­ve data.

Monitoring website and server availability #

At first glan­ce, this point sounds rather unspec­ta­cu­lar — howe­ver, it can quick­ly beco­me one of the most important aspects of the enti­re main­ten­an­ce con­tract. If you run an online store, you will sure­ly know what I am tal­king about.

Let’s just assu­me that it’s clo­se to Christ­mas and you’­re the owner of a lucra­ti­ve online store whe­re you sell your home­ma­de cho­co­la­te. Christ­mas is known to be one of the busie­st times of the year. Orders are coming in non-stop and you are busy pre­pa­ring the goods for ship­ping. Due to the increased num­ber of visi­tors (your cho­co­la­te is known to be the best) the­re are now ser­ver down­ti­mes becau­se the rush is just too enorm­ous (yes your cho­co­la­te is that good). But you won’t noti­ce any of this for the time being — becau­se you’­re still pack­ing, after all, the cho­co­la­te has to reach the cus­to­mer quick­ly. So it hap­pens that hours pass befo­re you are sur­pri­sed that no new orders have arri­ved. Sur­pri­sed, you now rea­li­ze that your online store is off­line. Only after con­sul­ting with sup­port and more hours drag­ging into the coun­try, your store is final­ly back online.

Well, but too late — in the mean­ti­me, your cus­to­mers have alre­a­dy orde­red from the com­pe­ti­ti­on. That’s how fast it can go — espe­ci­al­ly now, when the ran­ge of pro­ducts on offer is get­ting big­ger and big­ger.

Would­n’t it have been gre­at to have a com­pe­tent part­ner here who would have infor­med you direct­ly, or even taken direct action to ensu­re the ope­ra­ti­on of your online store? You’­re pro­ba­b­ly even thin­king to yours­elf now that it would have been bet­ter to have Word­Press main­ten­an­ce after all. You are right.

Last, but not least — the technical support #

Yes, tech­ni­cal sup­port is the heart of a good main­ten­an­ce packa­ge. Of cour­se you cover the base with the back­ups, the updates and the secu­ri­ty packa­ges — but who helps if you have ques­ti­ons or just want to be infor­med when things like DSGVO, coo­kie opt-in and imprint/data pro­tec­tion were not tech­ni­cal­ly imple­men­ted pro­per­ly? What hap­pens if the dis­play is no lon­ger accep­ta­ble after an update or if a plug-in throws an error mes­sa­ge? That’s right — the agen­cy behind the main­ten­an­ce con­tract. By the tech­ni­cal sup­port, advice and acces­si­bi­li­ty you can see the true value of Word­Press main­ten­an­ce.

The­re is not­hing bet­ter than kno­wing that someone is the­re if some­thing ever hap­pens or if the­re is a pro­blem. So you can work care­free wit­hout fear of dama­ging any­thing.

Conclusion #

Good main­ten­an­ce is worth its weight in gold. It saves time and ner­ves and helps with tech­ni­cal pro­blems and ques­ti­ons. For small and medi­um-sized com­pa­nies as well as asso­cia­ti­ons and self-employ­ed peo­p­le, main­ten­an­ce packa­ges are a cost-effec­­ti­­ve alter­na­ti­ve to a per­ma­nent IT employee. For as litt­le as €29, you can get good main­ten­an­ce that covers at least the basics. If you have to think about taking out main­ten­an­ce at 29 € / month, you should think about how much of your reve­nue is gene­ra­ted by the web­site. How gre­at would be the out­cry if the web­site is no lon­ger acces­si­ble or if expen­si­ve repairs beco­me neces­sa­ry. I per­so­nal­ly recom­mend ever­yo­ne to com­ple­te a main­ten­an­ce, espe­ci­al­ly to impro­ve the issue of data secu­ri­ty.

Why don’t you take a look at our main­ten­an­ce packa­ges? We have the right packa­ge for every need. Click here for Word­Press main­ten­an­ce.