A WordPress site is not a finished object. It is an assembly of software whose parts each move on their own: WordPress core, the theme, a dozen plugins, the PHP version on the server. Left unwatched, the assembly drifts out of alignment. This page sets out what serious WordPress maintenance involves, what it costs, and how it runs when it is entrusted to Aloha Pixel, in Pau, in south west France.
What happens to a site nobody is watching
The script repeats itself with depressing regularity. The site is delivered and everything works. Six months go by. One plugin’s author stops updating it. A year goes by. The host moves to a newer version of PHP and a page stops displaying. Eighteen months, and a bot picks up a published vulnerability in a form plugin: the site is now being used to send spam, which the owner discovers on noticing that their own emails no longer arrive.
The real cost is almost never the repair itself. It lies in the weeks when the site was slow, broken or flagged as dangerous by the browser, and in the Google rankings lost while that went on. A site that is down for several days sees its crawl rate slow, and the climb back takes far longer than the fall.
The six jobs of maintenance that holds up
Updates, tested before they are applied
Pressing “update all” is the riskiest click on the WordPress dashboard. A major plugin update can change a layout, clash with the theme or remove a function a page depends on. Good practice is to back up, apply, then check the sensitive pages: home, contact, the form, the checkout.
Backups, and above all restoring them
A backup that has never been restored is a hypothesis, not a safeguard. The sites we look after are backed up daily, files and database, kept for several days and stored away from the production server. A test restore is run periodically to check that the archive can actually be used.
Uptime monitoring
Knowing the site has gone down before the client hears it from someone else changes everything. A probe polls the site at regular intervals and triggers an alert on a server error or an abnormal response time.
Hardening security
Limiting login attempts, removing unused accounts, correct file permissions, disabling code editing from the admin, security headers on the server side. None of these settings is visible, but together they turn away the vast majority of automated attacks. The detail is in our guide to securing a WordPress site in eight essential measures.
Performance
Page weight grows naturally as publishing goes on: uncompressed images, a plugin added for a one-off need and then forgotten, third-party scripts piled one on top of another. A regular review resets the counters. It is cleaning work more than spectacular optimisation, and it can be measured directly in the Core Web Vitals.
Checking the technical SEO
An update can reintroduce an indexing block, break a sitemap or make a canonical tag disappear. A monthly check on these points spares you from finding out six months later that the site was no longer being crawled.
Taking over a site someone else built
It is the most common request we get in Pau: a site built two or three years ago, whose provider no longer answers, and which nobody dares touch. Taking it over never starts with an intervention, but with a written health check.
It records the WordPress and PHP versions in place, the list of plugins with the date of their last update, any code added directly into the theme (which will vanish at the theme’s first update, the classic trap), the state of the backups, the publicly known vulnerabilities, and who actually holds access to the domain name and the hosting. That last point regularly holds surprises: many business owners discover at this stage that their domain name is registered in their former provider’s name.
The report is handed to you before any commitment. It is yours, even if you decide to entrust what comes next to someone else.
Three ways to have your site looked after
The follow-up need not take the same form for a strategic site as for a secondary one.
| Plan | What it covers | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Support ticket | One hour of work on demand: a fix, a change, a new page, troubleshooting. No subscription. | €89 an hour |
| Pack of 5 tickets | Five hours of work to use as you see fit, for a site that changes regularly. | €399 |
| Website subscription | Maintenance, hosting, backups, security and tickets included, with SEO follow-up. | from €59 a month |
Prices in euros, VAT not applicable, article 293 B of the French tax code. Tickets have no expiry date, and the subscription can be cancelled without notice from the client area.
How a request works
You describe what you need in writing, with a screenshot and the address of the page concerned if you can. The request is picked up within 48 business hours. If the work runs beyond the time planned, you are told before, not after: no extra hour is billed without your agreement.
For genuine emergencies, a site that is unreachable or hacked, handling is immediate. A compromised site is dealt with in three stages: isolate it, restore a clean backup, then find and close the point of entry. Restoring without shutting the door amounts to being hacked twice.
Maintenance and independence are not at odds
Handing over maintenance does not mean depending on your provider to change an opening time. The clients we look after are walked through their site and keep their hands on their own content. Those who want to go further can take WordPress coaching in Pau to steer their own publishing, and leave the technical side to the agency.
It is the split that works best over time: you know your trade and your customers better than anyone, and the technical side should not be taking up your day.
Taking stock of your site
If you do not know what state your site is in, that is already an answer. A health check takes an hour and gives you a clear picture: what is up to date, what is exposed, what can be repaired and what deserves a redesign. Write to us or book a slot.
Further reading: managed cloud hosting in Pau, how we work and what happens to a site without maintenance.
Also worth reading: How to secure a WordPress site: the step-by-step guide
Get a support ticketAsk for a health check
