We can upgrade your ProcessWire, WordPress, or Shopify site.
By keeping your CMS up-to-date, you can be sure you’re making the most of your investment. These are four important reasons to upgrade.
1. Stronger Security
Keeping your site up-to-date is, by far, the single most critical action you can do for the security of your site. Using older software opens your site to security vulnerabilities.
2. Better Performance
Since speed is a huge factor in SEO, you should also keep your site upgraded to ensure maximum performance benefits.
3. Enhanced Features
New features are often introduced to stay up-to-date with compatibility and industry standards. Often third party plugin upgrades are coordinated with major software releases to ensure they’re taking advantage of new code.
4. Bug Fixes
Technical issues and bugs that are discovered with previous versions of a CMS are often resolved through minor upgrades. These fixes address common problems which can lead to unexpected broken functionality.
How Often Should I Upgrade?
It’s normally easier and cheaper to keep your CMS upgraded on a regular schedule than to deal with unexpected issues, but the frequency of upgrades is different for each CMS.
ProcessWire
For sites running on ProcessWire, we recommend upgrading your site biannually, or quarterly for heavy traffic sites.
WordPress
Because WordPress is more susceptible to hacking, we recommend upgrading every time there is a new security release which can be as frequently as monthly.
Shopify
Your Shopify theme will need to be upgraded when the theme designer releases a new version.
Webflow & Squarespace
Because Webflow and Squarespace are hosted content management solutions, upgrades to the service are automatic.
What We’ll Do
We will upgrade your CMS software — and much more. In addition, there are other important checks that need to be done on a regular basis. We’ll take care of those, too.
Perform a Full Backup
We will perform a manual backup of the database and all site files on your production server.
Upgrade CMS Software
Using the backup, we will create a copy of your site and will upgrade the CMS software to the latest version.
Install Latest Versions of Plugins
We’ll make sure your site is using the latest compatible version of all installed plugins.
Review CMS Admin Accounts
As employees change, we’ll remove unnecessary accounts and create new ones, if necessary.
Review Third-Party Accounts
Analytics, web fonts, and other third party accounts can expire. We’ll review the ones used on your site to make sure they are working.
Test Site Search
We’ll check your site’s search functionality to make sure it is working properly and that new content is showing up in results.
Test Online Forms
We’ll test each online form to make sure they’re working properly and recipients are receiving submissions.
Confirm Email Addresses
We’ll make sure form recipients and other email addresses on your site are current.
Optional Updates
There are a number of enhancements that your site may benefit from if you haven’t implemented them already. They can help you get even more out of your website.
Migrate to HTTPS
Give your site an SEO ranking boost and protect your visitors’ connection to your website by installing a security certificate.
Upgrade PHP
As older versions of PHP are no longer provided with security updates, your hosting provider may recommend an upgrade.
Setup Google Search Console
Previously known as Google Webmaster Tools, this free service can help to monitor and maintain your site’s presence in Google Search results.
Install Security Plugin
If your site is running on WordPress, we’ll install and configure a security plugin, scan your site for security risks, and make appropriate changes.
Install Caching Plugin
Increase website performance and reduce page load time by enabling your web server to deliver web pages as if they were static HTML files.
Report Errors
We’ll let you know if we come across any errors and what we can do to fix them.
Before We Start
To perform maintenance on your site, we may need login credentials to some of the following accounts. We will manage your logins with utmost security (and we’re happy to sign NDA paperwork if necessary).
Domain Registrar
Your domain name is registered with a domain registrar. In some instances, you may have registered with your hosting provider.
Hosting Provider
The login to your hosting account allows us to manage your various hosted services and, if necessary, communicate with your hosting provider’s support team.
Control Panels
Provided by the hosting provider, this login provides administrative access to your server and allows us to upload and manage files and templates, setup databases, and perform site backups. Common control panels include WHM (WebHost Manager) and cPanel.
MySQL Database
Managing your site’s database is usually performed through software such as phpMyAdmin. We’ll need the database name and server, username, and password.
SFTP Login
FTP allows us to transfer website files between our computer and your remote server. SFTP enables secure file transfer capabilities between networked hosts.
Google Analytics and/or Google Tag Manager
We’ll need to be added as a user to set up analytics and make sure the site is tracking visitors properly.
Hosted Web Font Services
If you aren’t using a free hosted web font service, we may need the service name, username, and password to your subscription-based account(s).
Other Accounts
Additional accounts may include your DNS provider or SSL certificate authority.
