So the site runs, and somebody answers when it does not.
Hosting, security, backups and fixes, on one bill and with a stated deadline. This page also says what maintenance is not, because that is where most of the disappointment comes from.
Who it is for
Maintenance is not compulsory, but going without has a price.
Worth it if
- The site brings enquiries or orders, so every hour of downtime costs something.
- You have nobody who would know what to do when an error appears or a certificate expires.
- The last time you asked for a small change you waited a week and did not know who to call.
Not worth it if
- The site is a business card that never changes and brings no enquiries. Plain hosting is enough there.
- You already have someone doing this. Two contractors on one site cause more damage than they prevent.
- You expect the monthly fee to bring rankings too. That is a different service and it says below why.
The problem
Three ways a site quietly falls apart.
It goes down unnoticed
The site has been down since Friday afternoon and you hear about it on Monday from a customer. Every enquiry that should have arrived went to a competitor instead.
No backup when it counts
Somebody edited the wrong page or an update broke. Without a backup it gets rebuilt by hand, if at all, and that is the most expensive day of the year.
A small change takes a week
A phone number or a price needs changing. There is nobody to call, so the wrong detail stays up and the phone rings because of it.
Managed hosting
Eight things for one yearly figure.
This is not just space on a server. Space costs little. Everything else is the reason the site still runs next year.
Per yearBAM 300 to 450
Setup
A server configured for that site, not an empty package with something copied into it.
Domain and DNS
The domain points where it should and the records are kept tidy, so a move one day is not a drama.
SSL certificate
The padlock in the browser, renewed automatically. An expired certificate scares a visitor more than any error does.
Business email
An address on your own domain, not a free one carrying somebody else's name. Setup and help when a new employee is added.
Daily backup
A backup is taken every day and the last 30 days are kept. Restoring to any of those days is a matter of minutes, not days.
Monitoring
A check that the site is up, without waiting for someone to notice it is down. If it falls over, I hear about it first.
Fixes
When something breaks, it gets fixed. This is the part managed hosting exists for, not the price of the space.
Renewals
Domain and certificates get renewed in time. A domain that expires over a weekend can be lost for good.
The figure depends on how large the site is and how much traffic it takes. An ordinary business site sits at the lower end, a shop with a catalogue at the upper end.
Prices do not include VAT
Care plans
When you need a pair of hands, not just a server.
Care is time, not space. You are paying for somebody being there to answer and make the change, within a stated deadline and without negotiating it every time.
plusOptional, on top of annual hosting
Care Basic
MonthlyBAM 99 to 129for at least six monthsWho forA site that sits stable and needs a small change now and then.
- Updates and security patches
- Checks on backups and monitoring
- One smaller change a month
- A reply within the agreed time
Care Pro
MonthlyBAM 199 to 249for at least six monthsWho forA site that genuinely changes and where downtime costs money.
- Everything in Basic
- Up to three smaller changes a month
- Priority in the queue
- A speed review every three months
There are no unlimited changes, and that is deliberate. Unlimited in practice means somebody else waits while your request is handled, or that the change gets dragged out. I would rather say how many are included and hold to it, and price a bigger job separately.
Important
Maintenance is not SEO.
This is the most common misunderstanding in the whole offer and the reason this page exists. Both are paid monthly, but they do two completely different things.
Care holds what exists
- The site runs, is secure and has a backup
- Updates and small edits to what is there
- Somebody answers when something breaks
- Rankings stay roughly where they are
Growth adds what is new
- New pages and content that bring visits
- Technical SEO and work on rankings
- Enquiry measurement and a monthly report
- The goal is more enquiries than last month
If you pay for Care only and expect growth, you will rightly be disappointed a year from now. That is why it says so here, and not in the small print of a contract.
When you need me
A stated deadline, not a promise.
The clock starts when the request arrives, on working days. If something is down, it does not wait in the queue.
Reply1 working day
Resolution3 working days
A site that is down goes first
A site that will not load is not a request in a queue, it is an outage. There is no waiting on a deadline there, it gets worked on as soon as I know, and usually I know before you do.
Requests are handled in order
Everything else enters the queue in the order it arrives. Care Pro has priority in that queue, and that is one of the things the plan buys.
You hear it if I am running late
If something takes longer than the deadline, you will hear it from me before it expires, with the reason and a new date. Silence is worse than a delay.
Ownership
It is all yours, including when you leave.
This is the part almost nobody writes on a website, and it says the most about how the work gets done. No part of your business should depend on the two of us getting along.
- 01
The domain is in your name
It is registered to you, not to me. I have access to maintain it, but you are the owner and it says so in the public domain record.
- 02
The content and data are yours
Text, images, enquiries and figures belong to you. I do not hold them as collateral and I do not use them as a reference without your consent.
- 03
Leaving takes one day
If you take on another contractor, you get a copy of the site, the database and the access. No dragging it out, no exit fee and no asking why.
- 04
No lock in
The site does not sit on something only I can maintain. The next contractor takes it over without having to rebuild everything from scratch.
Not included
What is billed separately.
I write this up front, because maintenance often gets read as a subscription to anything that comes up.
- New pages, new features and redesigns
- Writing content and photography
- SEO work on rankings and the monthly report
- Repairing damage caused by a change somebody else made
Questions
What I get asked most.
- Do I have to host with you?
- You do not. If your hosting already sits somewhere and works, I can do Care only. I offer managed hosting because then I answer for the whole chain, not just for my part of it.
- What if you did not build the site?
- I take on other people's sites, but I look at the state of them first. For inherited code I do not give a fixed price before I see what is inside.
- How long are backups kept?
- A backup is taken every day and the last 30 days are kept. That means the site can be restored to any day in that month, not only to the most recent state.
- What counts as a smaller change?
- Changing text, a price, an image, opening hours, or adding an item to an existing list. A new page or a new feature is not a change but a job, and it is priced as one.
- Does Care improve my Google rankings?
- No. Care keeps the site alive and secure. Rankings are Growth, a separate service with a separate price. This is the one thing I will not blur in a description.
- What if I stop?
- You get a copy of the site, the database and all the access, with no exit fee. The domain is in your name anyway, so there is nothing to transfer away from me.
Next step
First let me see what state it is in.
Send me your website address. I will check how it stands on speed, security and backups, and tell you what I would actually touch.