Even basic websites are quite complicated technical systems nowadays and it’s just not feasible to set and forget and then expect everything to remain properly functional and secure. They require regular updates that need to be done by humans, resolving of issues caused by said updates, security and uptime monitoring and a host of general housekeeping.
And then of course, there’s small changes to be made, update copy or contact details, change a pic that’s getting on your nerves, take down a post that’s no longer relevant or accurate maybe. Small changes like this can all be wrapped into a maintenance agreement or hours bundle.
Sadly, security is an increasingly tricky issue. As fast as mainstream providers work to protect and defend the technology your website depends on to stay live and perform, there are armies of hackers out there constantly looking for ways to take advantage of any vulnerability to invade your web property or even hijack it completely. The most common sources of vulnerabilities are plug ins and themes that haven’t been updated. Hackers know just how to find them too.
A great deal can be done in setting up a website to protect it and all our website builds include security and performance measures to keep the site safe and healthy by default. But ongoing maintenance is nonetheless essential and works out a lot cheaper than cleaning up and restoring a hacked site.
Our maintenance agreements start at £15 a week, billed quarterly, to monitor, check forms are functioning and generally keep the lights on and empty the bins for basic sites. For sites with more complex functionalities, especially financial transactions, we will discuss ongoing maintenance with you at the outset to allow you to consider what the cost might be to maintain complex functions securely before you give us the go ahead to implement it.
We can construct a bespoke retainer package for you and you’ll be able to choose whether to pay us enough so that we will take care of anything that arises or bill extra if, for instance, a serious hack occurs where we might need to engage specific expertise to set things to rights to a guarantee-able level.
We can also help you retrieve and repair sites that are broken or hacked, help you move it to a new host and set up your emails.
Where we take over a website that we have not built ourselves, we will conduct an audit of it’s present state of health and provision, agree a fixed price to install or change whatever measures are lacking before proceeding to a monthly, quarterly or annual fee arrangement with discounts for multiple sites.