There is a line on our homepage that reads: we don’t hand you the keys and disappear. I mentioned in the latest Seventeen launch post that this site runs on the same Cinch systems and infrastructure that support our client sites. But what does that actually mean? What does our daily support look like? Here’s the actual checklist – what steps do we take and what are the reasons behind them.
Backups that can be quickly restored
We take backups daily, and for some customers real time and keep between 30 – 90 days worth. We store them off site and can spin any one of them up into a staging version of that dated backup. When something goes wrong we can quickly restore a plugin, or a theme or broken content. We can spin up a test restore and staging site in a quick and secure manner.
Updates, daily
WordPress core, themes, and plugins all ship updates constantly, and most of the important ones are security patches. The gap between patch released and patch applied is exactly the window attackers work in, so we close it daily instead of monthly. Daily also means updates are applied sequentially, you’re not skipping versions, and they come in one or two at a time. Updates that happen monthly or when ever you get around to it means you need to did deep to detect an issue.
Security scanning
We scan daily for malware, file-change detection, login protections, and check against the threat and block lists the get you on the banned on Google or find a front-page malware takeover. The point isn’t that something gets in — mostly it doesn’t — it’s that if something does, you find out from a scan instead of from a customer.
Uptime monitoring
A robot checks every site around the clock and complains to us the moment one stops answering. Most outages are short and boring. The service we’re selling is that we find out first, and you find out from us — usually past tense.
The server backbone
All of this runs on dedicated servers we manage, not shared hosting with five hundred strangers and their abandoned plugins. Your neighbors matter: on cheap shared hosting, someone else’s hacked site is your performance problem and sometimes your security problem.
30-Minute fixes
Beyond the daily maintenance we’re here for the quick fixes and updates, to check in when things go wrong, and to quickly get it all sorted. As important as the daily tasks are, it’s this support that our customers stick around for. It’s like having a developer in your back pocket. Much cheaper than a full time staff person.
Not hosted with us? Steal the checklist
Whoever looks after your site, these are the questions:
- How often do updates run — and who checks the site afterward?
- Where do backups live, how long are they kept, and when did anyone last restore one?
- What’s scanning the site for malware and file changes?
- Who finds out first when the site goes down?
- Is the hosting shared, and with how many other sites?
If the answers are vague, that’s an answer too.
The reasoning
None of this is glamorous. It’s the difference between a website that quietly keeps working and one that becomes your problem at the worst possible time. We’d rather it be our problem. So that it’s not a problem for you.
