WordPress Ongoing Maintenance and Security

Having web sites run smoothly and safe from hackers, is important to me. It probably is important to you too, if you think about it a little. If you heard of any web site getting hacked, you know that could ruin your business day quickly.

When you find out your site has been hacked, or your site stopped working so you can’t generate sales, you know you’re not going to be having a good day.

After all, it’s easier to prevent problems like these, than to fix them…

You have been told, already, you need to keep your software updated… You need to do regular backups… You know you should be blocking hackers, even if you don’t know how… Are you hoping you can last a little longer, letting maintenance slide?

Preventing hackers from abusing your site is one very important part of running your web site, yet so many people and businesses just don’t have the time to do all the steps it takes. Even if you know how, or learn how, it’s not a good use of your time. You have better things to do!

We all know your web site working, the way it should, helps to keep your reputation good. It also increases sales, right?

Maintenance, done frequently, is important for your site.

Latest updates to your WordPress software (and all other software) does several things, including fixing bugs that keep your site operating well, adding new features, and also fixing any security problems that have been discovered.

Hackers know all those security problems. They study every security problem found world-wide, for how to take advantage of them.

Updates Without Problems

If an update does make a problem on your site, I know how to identify the problem very quickly, and get your site working again.

However, I also prevent problems by testing plugin updates on a testing site, before doing the update on your site.

I can replicate your site setup, plugins, theme, and content, on a testing site that is not accessible from the Internet. I will check the updates don’t introduce errors, whether with PHP or the WordPress database or other plugins.

How Do You Get Your Site Secure From Hackers?

Whether hackers want to post ads for their junk, or add links to steal traffic from you, or install malware to get your private information, or use your website hosting account to hack other sites, I hate hackers!

Most businesses don’t have anyone who knows how to do maintenance and security checks properly. It’s complex. It takes time to learn, time to check everything each month. Most people could learn to do it themselves, if they were interested and had the time; but it’s just not your most fun and exciting thing to do. It’s not what you would best be spending your time on.

(If that does sound good to you, contact me, I need more people helping have web sites run smoothly and be safe from hackers…)

There are WordPress plugins that take care of many security steps. These have to be configured, and tested (some website hosting companies have non-standard server configurations, so not all security options will work on all hosting). [Note: If you’re on a Microsoft IIS server, which can’t use the most common WordPress security plugins, I feel for you, and I can help some…]

You have to host your WordPress site on a company that has very strong security. Most of the best-known hosting companies are negligent about security; they don’t even keep the server software current; they don’t know WordPress security and troubleshooting; and they are not actively looking for ways to improve security. The best hosting companies have staff researching global security discussion boards for the latest hacker vulnerabilities, and put specific security rules in dedicated hardware installed between the Internet and the servers they host your site on.

Another important security step is using passwords for every login that are difficult for hackers to guess. And the way we’ve been taught to make “secure” passwords, for example substituting punctuation for vowels or adding a digit and punctuation mark at the end, are known by hackers too — and now those passwords are easily and quickly guessed. Long computer-generated passwords are highly secure, but impossible for people to remember and difficult to type. I can teach you how to make secure passwords both easy to remember and easy to type.

What I Provide

Whether you want to learn to do it yourself, or you want me to take care of your maintenance and site security, here is what I provide:

• Set up your WordPress site so it runs well. This includes removing plugins you don’t use, or that are security risks, or haven’t been updated in ages; adding plugins that are essential to the your site running properly; setting up site security so the most common attacks are blocked
• Keep your site security updated so it is much harder to hack (so you keep out most hackers, but I can’t stop government-level hacking groups).
• Keep current and past backups so your site can be recovered if something goes wrong. You always need a good backup!
• If you have more than one site, or know you want more sites, I can set up WordPress Multi-Site for you, easier for most companies than working with many single-site installations of WordPress.
• Select good plugins and themes. I find well written plugins and themes, that work well, don’t slow your site down, and are unlikely to have security vulnerabilities that hackers could exploit. Tip: with the WordPress block editor, you most likely can use the default TwentyTwenty theme, or a child theme that simply specifies your colors.
• Migrate your site to an excellent hosting company, if you think you might already be hacked, or if you don’t know your host has excellent security and technical support. A few hosting companies charge comparable amounts per year of hosting, but provide much better quality service and much better protection against hackers, than the normal hosting company. You almost certainly can’t find better hosting on your own, than the Arizona WordPress Meetup has found.
• Work with your hosting company technical support, to resolve any issues, so you won’t have to. (You’ll be able to use them or me for technical support.)
• Improve your marketing, including install and configure software for telling Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and other social media sites what you want them to display (text and image) when someone references a page on your site.
• Find what would speed up your site, which your visitors will love and so will search engines.

Contact me about your site maintenance and security and what you want, and we’ll know if we’re a good match.