All backups with the Perugi Design Basic Plan are saved monthly. If you wish to backup more frequently, let me know. For those of you not on my plan, but using Bluehost as your hosting company, you can reach out if you need help with backups or upgrading plugins and themes.

Please read the notice below and email me with any questions.

“In an ongoing effort to bring you the very best products and services, we’re excited to announce that we will be upgrading all of our servers to newer versions of PHP. In addition to improved data processing, which can boost your site’s speed and performance, you’ll also gain increased security. Newer versions of PHP have more frequent security updates to help protect your site against unwanted hacks or malware.

When will it happen?
At some point during the upgrade window — November 16, 2020 through November 20, 2020 — your account will be updated, and older versions of PHP will no longer be supported. You may experience a brief disruption in service, but we will work to upgrade your site quickly with the most updated version of PHP software your website will support.

Do I need to do anything on my end?
Yes, to avoid a negative impact to your site, we recommend that you upgrade all of your web installations to the newest PHP software available before we move your account. Newer versions of PHP are already available on your current server, and you can set your site to use those versions with this helpful guide. You should also backup all of your website files.”

Also, yesterday I noticed one of my clients had a problem with a Google Map. They own a miniature golf facility and needed some updates to their website. On the home page is a full column map, or, there was supposed to be. Years ago (before 2016) Google changed their rules, this was not an issue. Today, you must go to the Google Developer Tools page to get a Google API key. Not easy and really frustrating. Any one of a number of steps can upset the configuration and you get a map that won’t load and throws an error.

I’m a big believer in Plugins to help solve anything website related. I found one called GoogleMaps Widget by Web Factory Ltd. I first tried out the free version, but that was not adequate. For $49 you can buy three website’s worth of the PRO version that will last indefinitely. So I upgraded. Spinning wheels is not a good way to waste time. The PRO works great, but not without reading at least some of the documentation. For instance, large size maps can only be achieved using Interactive Maps. And there is a button you must select to load the map to the page. Great plugin and not expensive. I highly recommend it. As with all plugins, check in regularly to update it when required.

1. SECURITY: Weekly updating of your software, WordPress, Theme, and Plugins, will help keep up with security assaults. You may not realize that malware and spam is an ongoing problem for small websites too. The robots sweep through looking for vulnerabilities without discretion to find a place to insert their bad code. Your site becomes the conduit through which the virus  spreads. WordPress itself updates over twelve times a year, then the Themes and Plugins follow suit. Perugi Design uses state of the art software to approve these updates each week or more often, if prompted. If there is a problem, it is hunted down and addressed.
2. BACKUPS: Your site can go down for various reasons. Sometimes, it gets infected, sometimes the code or php software is outdated. Perugi backups your website at least once a month, so that it can be restored to a previous, uncontaminated version. If you blog often or have an e-commerce site, you may want to back up once a week. Knowing that you have a safe version of your website that can be immediately restored is reassuring. Each week I look to make sure your site has been backing up, so you have a fresh version for a restore.
3. CONFLICTS: I will know when the software is not updating. There can be several reasons. It was not updated automatically and the plugin or theme must be downloaded from the developer and reinstalled manually. There are plugins that conflict with each other, with the theme or with my software. I will let you know when this is an issue before changing any plugins running on your website.

If you run into a problem and you don’t have professional help, give us a call at 617-365-3418. Find plans on the Services Page of my website for more information and to sign up.

Perugi Design has several Web Care Plans to fit your goals and budget. We can update your website software (WordPress, themes and plugins) on a weekly basis and schedule backups as often as you need. We also keep in touch with your hosting company when issues arise as part of all three bundled Web Care Plans.

Here is a list of the tasks a website typically needs on a weekly and monthly basis. We do most of these for you for only $10 per month.

1. Backing up your website
Your website should be backed up at least monthly and stored on several servers. Don’t depend on your hosting company. Some backup and some do not. If your site gets damaged from malware or gets hacked, you will need to restore your entire website and you will need a clean backup to do it. We use Amazon Web Services for our backups.

2. Installing updates
WordPress Software gets updated at least 12 times a year in order to add new features or to for important security reasons. I usually wait a week or two before updating the WP software, to allow the other third party plugins and themes to catch up. Updating the plugins is also important, as they may interfere or stop working after any new WordPress updates.

3. Processing comments
You may receive comments if you use the default settings on your blog. Sometimes they are welcome, but other times, you get spam. Going through the dashboard, you can find these and approve or trash as you see fit. If you don’t check in on a regular basis, the spam comments can add up. But, we can use a plugin to regulate comments or turn it off. Spam can come through the forms as well. Always use a Captcha to prevent this from happening.

4. Setting up security
Receiving spam comments leads to security concerns. There are several good plugins or hosting add-ons you can use to secure your site from being hacked. This is a major concern for many people and should be. When a site gets hacked, our hosting company detects it and will shut it down to protect the other sites on a shared hosting plan. Uptime Security is another feature to consider. You and your web manager find out when your site goes down so that you can attend to the situation immediately.

5. Optimizing your database and checking performance
If you have a busy site with tons of content continually being uploaded, your database will probably need cleaning out. By maintaining your database it will help to improve your loading speeds and reduce the frequency of database errors. There are several free plugins to help you with this.

6. Checking Google Analytics
This is more about marketing, but some clients ask for help setting up analytics. It is useful to help you determine if an ad or blog post was popular. Use this information when planning your next campaign.

Remember, updating your website’s software is vital to reaching your customers in a positive way.

Services for Web Care

• SEO by Yoast. Yoast has been trouble for Divi users lately. I recommend All In One SEO.
• Speed: WP Rocket. This would be worth trying if you notice your site loads slowly. First make sure all your images are optimized, meaning small enough for the web at 72 dpi.
• Social Media: Monarch Social Media Sharing. This adds buttons for people to share your content. I find them messy, but great for the right business.
• Page Builder: I use Elegant Themes builder theme, DIVI by Elegant Themes.
• Security: IThemes Security Pro. I use Sucuri and WordFence also recommended by ET.
• Backup: VaultPress. Use this if you don’t use my service, Manage WP.
• List Building: Bloom Email. Worth looking at.
• Email Newsletter: MyMail. Also try Mail Poet. 
• Contact Forms: Contact Form 7. Very popular. The one I use is Caldera Form Builder. The one that comes with Divi Theme is good for light use. Sometimes the forms are blocked by the server in which case you add on Send Grid.
• Live Chat: Pure Chat. Would love to add this to someones website. Are you game?
• First Impressions: Video Intro. Worth looking at.
• Maintenance Mode: Anticipate. While your site is under construction. Worth looking at.
• Broken Links: Redirection. I’m going to try this.
• Editorial Calendar: CoSchedule. Preschedule your posts. Lots of great marketing tips on their email letter.
• Boost Conversions: WordPress Calls to Action. I’m going to try this. Will let you know.

But, don’t get too excited and import all of these plugins at once! I generally like to keep my sites lean. Too many plugins can cause conflicts in your design. I have experienced seemingly impossible problems caused by a plugin. Best practice is to update your plugins and themes when called for and remove the ones you no longer use after turning them off.

The sad truth is that hackers are more sophisticated at catching us unaware. Their success relies on quantity. If one person buys their bogus offer, then maybe others will as well.

In the past, we learned, that you never go to your bank or Paypal website by clicking a button sent by email. Always go to the url of the company and then look for the message or offer on their home page. The bank will be well aware by then and post a warning. Misspellings were often a giveaway. You can be pretty sure Bank of America will not publish an email with a misspelling. But, look out… Today, it may not be so easy to detect.

If you start receiving annoying emails with a big UNSUBSCRIBE button flashing at you, don’t go near it. Malware could be inserted into your email to then gain access to your email address and send out the same offer to many other people you don’t know. Your hosting company, always on the lookout, will shut down your website (and your POP email) if they catch malware in your files. It is your job, then, to get it cleaned out by contacting a company such as WeWatchYourWebsite.com. It may take a day, or two, or even a whole week before you can ask your host to get you reinstated.

But, how do we avoid malicious code in the first place? Here is a list of ways you can be proactive in the fight against malware:

1. Add spam filtering to your email. This prevents the spam email from gaining your attention. If you aren’t receiving junk email, you won’t be tempted.
2. Add the Surcuri plugin to your WordPress website. This is a free plugin by a reputable company. Update your plugins and WP software regularly. They often come with security updates.
3. Back up your website, weekly or monthly.  I back mine up to Amazon S3, but you can back a website up to your computer or server also.
4. Back up  your computer. Use an external hard drive or the cloud. Do it monthly.
5. Use secure passwords. I can’t emphasize this enough. I use a password generator to create mine, then copy them to a secure area on my laptop.

And always be on the alert. If you detect anything suspicious, run to We Watch Your Website, and hope for the best!

Vladimir Prelovac is the Founder of ManageWP, and is a frequent contributor to the WordPress community – in the form of numerous plug-ins, tools, and a book by the title WordPress Plugin Development. His blog, accessible via the weekly notices you get when you subscribe, provides timely and interesting posts, such as the aforementioned Shellshock security nightmare.

If you are a diligent web developer, you try to make your client’s sites as secure from infection and inform them when their site has a problem. Viewing their dashboard on a weekly basis is necessary. When ManageWp sends me the email, I follow the link to my ManageWP dashboard and make the updates right away. While there, I can easily enter client’s WordPress dashboard and poke around.

I looked into ManageWP, as Bluehost recommended, was because I wanted to offer hosting as a reseller for clients who wanted their websites managed. For a small monthly fee, I can follow up to 30 websites, But, the hard part was, moving their sites into my reseller server area. Bluehost charges $100 for each website move and Go Daddy even more. With ManageWP, I can do it in minutes and charge just for my time.

Back up is also a handy tool. Before you make any major updates to the sites, they should be backed up. I have an account on the Amazon S3 cloud and all I have to do is create a bucket for the new site on Amazon and ManageWP handles it with the push of a button. One more great feature incorporates Google Analytics. You can import the data and create a report to email.

If you are running your own site, or fewer than 5 sites, the software is free. Check it out and let me know how you like it and or if you have any questions. Better yet, contact them yourself, as they have a pretty good help ticket desk on board.