Vision is a website design and development agency, with domain and hosting partners. This means working with us you can go from concept to full-functioning website with one marketing company. A part of our services, regardless of if you host with us or not, is regular web maintenance built into most of our flat-rate contracts. A common question from prospective clients is what’s the purpose behind website maintenance and what’s included in the package. Here’s an idea what of website maintenance is and why it is so important.
Troubleshooting Issues
As a business owner, having your website down means a potential loss of clients. For those who simply buy a website without website maintenance, any sudden issues with the website must be handled separately, and typically billed separately. This means calling up your host and figuring why the website is down, trying to go in and troubleshoot the issue yourself, or waiting on the phone while customer service goes down their dialogue tree to walk you through the issue. Website maintenance with our contracts means that we will troubleshoot any issue, even if it means waiting on hold with your host so you don’t have to (if you opt not to host with us).
Security Updates
One of the most important parts of website maintenance is keeping your website secure. Websites, especially those built on content management systems such as WordPress, have a lot of moving parts. From themes to plugins to installed website security, updates are often made to patch security exploits. If your website is left with outdated systems, it is left vulnerable to active hackers, as well as malware and viruses.
Updating Plugins and Integrations
Like with security concerns, these same plugins and integrations that run on your website are constantly being updating to improve functionality and reduce issues and errors. Leaving these systems un-updated means missing out on improved features and user experience (at best), and at worst can cause these parts of your website to fail, which can result in part of your website breaking or the entire website going down. Yes, it can happen.
Changes to Your Website
Need to change a phone number, update your staff section, or even add a new line of products? Without a maintenance contract, you’re either going to have to put on the web developer hat yourself or sign another contract for the project. We help our clients with minor changes to their website as part of their monthly maintenance contract, though sizable projects may have to be billed separately. Oftentimes, our clients opt to use it as a “savings” account to where they can “bank” hours to use on a larger project down the road. Either way – it’s your time to have used however you need.
Keeping Up with Best Practices
The internet is a changing place, and so are the best practices that social media, search engines, and other websites employ. For example, you may have heard about how SSL is becoming a mandatory part of browser and search engine experiences, and how going without it can affect how people view and find your website. SSL is a great thing to have on your website, but isn’t a user-friendly installation, and if managed correctly, the labor can be covered under a standard maintenance contract
We hope this blog has helped you understand the importance of having website maintenance included as part of your website development process and ongoing website health. If you’re looking for a new website or to update your current one, give us a call at Vision. Beyond website design and development, we also can help you develop a powerful brand on social media, advertise effectively online, and much more.
