WordPress has many strengths. The whole reason it was created was to “democratise publishing” for people across the world. It excels at blog-style websites that have a few other pages (such as “contact us” and “about”), so it seems like it’s the ideal solution for small business owners.
So why don’t we recommend it?
A Trade Off
WordPress is deceptively straightforward to start with. You can buy hosting that pre-installs it ready for you to use. And there’s a huge range of plugins you can use to add features, change the look and feel, and basically do anything you want with it.
I say “deceptively simple”, and I meant that.
What you’re getting is the first 80% of what you need straight out of the gate. It’s true, there are few website builders that are easier.
But what’s actually happening is that your trading that 80% of effort for the other 20% .. and that’s much more challenging effort.
Let the Fun Times Commence
Things are probably going great initially. You’ve got your website, it works fine. But then you hit that innocent little button on the plugin that says “update now”.
And suddenly the website is broken.
How do you roll it back?
The truth is, it’s exceptionally difficult. You have to manually download the plugin, extract the files, login to your hosting control panel (do you have access? What was the password again? Where is the right page?) and upload the files.
You might need to learn how FTP works really quickly. “What is FTP?” I hear you ask. Exactly my point.
Just To Compound Things
In my view this is a situation that leaves business owners in too precarious a position.
“Easy”, I hear you saying “I just won’t update my plugins ever again”.
But that is the worst thing you can do.
Leaving WordPress and it’s themes and plugins as they are, no matter how much you’re being nagged to update, is a very risky strategy.
It’s the exact thing hackers are looking for.
There are freely available tools that you can point at a WordPress website and scan it. It reveals all of the plugins you have, their versions, and whether there are any mistakes in the code that hackers can use to get access or do other damage to your site.
Scary? Yes, a bit.
It can take a lot of effort to restore a website that’s been hacked. That’s time you’ll have to pay a professional for. And that’s not taking into account that if search engines or browser companies find out, they could blacklist your domain.
I don’t think I need to explain that this is bad news for your business.
That’s why we don’t recommend it.
So what’s the alternative?
A Better Option
We work with systems that separate the “frontend” or the publicly visible part of your site, from the code that’s needed to give you control over it (the “CMS” or Content Management System).
We use different solutions based on what is best for our clients needs.
We don’t want to try to impose something on you that isn’t going to be a good fit. But at the same time we have years of expertise with different solutions. We know their pricing structures, and in some cases we know personally the teams that are building them.
This means your website’s attack surface goes down dramatically, often to around zero. And it reduces the chance that anything you do will break the website for your visitors.
It also reduces the cost of hosting the site dramatically. We charge a minimum fee to cover our expenses on this hosting because it’s simple and cost effective.
Would You Like to Stop Worrying?
We all would. And I can’t actually promise that. But I can make it easier. No more risky plugin updates. No more sleepless nights worrying if your site might be hacked. And no FTP. Ever.
To speak to us please fill out the contact form today. We look forward to chatting.