A broken website is a useless website
You spent months and invested thousands of dollars to have your new website available for the entire world to view, generate visits, leads and hopefully sales of a service or product.
Once online however the work does not stop there, you have to update content such as news, events, products and services. A lot of effort goes into keeping your visitor’s interest peaked.
An often neglected aspect of owning a website is maintenance This is especially true if you use a content management systems (CMS) like WordPress. A neglected site over time will become vulnerable and for the unlucky few, hackers can take control of your site and post whatever they want using your domain name.
Here a few simple tips to keep things tidy and avoid possible problems in the future:
Backup regularly
You should at the very least make a full back up of your site once a week. This includes your SQL database as well as all your files and images in your public_html folder.
If your site has ecommerce or has a large number of visitors on a daily basis, consider installing a plugin that will back up your SQL every 12 or 24 hours. That way you’re certain not to loose any potential leads, subscribers or customers.
Keep your WordPress updated
This is not only to take advantage of new features and functionalities, it is also to patch possible vulnerabilities.
Keep your theme updated
Same reasoning applies here as above. Also don’t forget if you use a framework such as Genesis your must update your parent as well as the child theme. Delete the unused WordPress default themes
Keep your plugins updated
This is by far one of the most overlooked yet important features. Some sites have dozens of plugins running various aspects of a CMS site and the developers are constantly updating features and fixing bugs. Also delete any used plugins.
Note: You should make a full back up of your database and files before updating so you can revert back in case something goes wrong or a plugin is causing conflicts with your site.
Use STRONG passwords wordpress installation secure
Cat, pizza or 123456 are not recommended passwords! Opt for a bullet proof password that uses Capital letters, Small letters, Digits and Symbols : KVe-S2l-<_:+F!$9lu”MX=)r8 .This password method applies for all your login entry points, wp-login, FTP as well as your cPanel.
Although these tips do not prevent a maliciously intended individual for entering your site by infraction, it will make things that much harder and they will probably look for an easier prey!
