Knowledgebase

So you now have a brand new shiny website :-)  Congratulations! 

Whilst we wish you all the success with your new website, as with anything else that you own, there are some upkeep responsibilities.  You (or us if you prefer) will need to perform some duties to keep your website running smoothly and to ensure it stays safe.  This is a very important job and should not be disregarded: Last year, Forbes claimed that 30,000 websites were being hacked every day (link to article).  How you choose to do this is up to you: you can either do it yourself, or have us do it for you.  The following helpful information is taken from our terms of services page.

Evaluation and Handover
Once your website goes live, we will provide a period of time (typically 30 days) of evaluation where we will fix any issues or bugs, or correct any typos etc, that may have been missed.  After the evaluation period, we will "handover" the website to you and it will then be your responsibility to keep the site up to date, secure and optimised.  If you host your website with us, we will of course provide "server-level" hosting support and you may also (optionally) engage us to perform updates for you (see Club Purple below).

Security & Ongoing Maintenance Responsibility: IMPORTANT
Your website is likely to feature software, scripts or apps, whether from 3rd party vendors (e.g. WordPress) or otherwise. It is the nature of software evolution that security patches and / or bug fixes and / or feature updates are continually being released.

Following Evaluation and Handover, it's vitally important that your website software is kept up-to-date to avoid any potential security vulnerabilities and / or to take advantage of any new features.  Unfortunately, new security vulnerabilities are discovered regularly, and what was considered safe "today" may in fact, be considered unsafe "tomorrow" (and will therefore require upgrading). 

We do provide best endeavours to alert our customers of any known issues, however, following Handover, it will be entirely YOUR responsibility to ensure your software is kept up to date and that any security vulnerabilities that are discovered are addressed with the recommended course of action as soon as possible.

DIY: What You are responsible for:
a) Ensuring any and all site software is kept up-to-date with the latest versions & security releases;
b) Performing all such software updates Yourselves (or via someone that you engage);
c) Any failure, error or malfunction of your website or part therof, that occurs as a result of any update you did or did not perform or as a result of any security exploit/malware/hacking. In this instance, if You request Our assistance, We will do our best to assist You (dependent upon our availability), at Our standard hourly rates.
d) All data / file security / password integrity associated with Your site & for performing and retaining any website data back-ups (except where We host Your site on Our servers, in which case We shall provide support as per our agreed standard terms).
e) Keeping all software license renewals up to date and complying with any 3rd party agreements that may be relevent.
f) Running your site and editting, modifying or adding new content.


Managed Purple Dog Service (Recommended)
If you prefer, we can manage updates and keep regular backups for you.  Many clients prefer this option as it is one less thing to worry about;
a) Purchase a Club Purple membership (Recommended as this also includes other benefits such as reduced hourly rates or free training), or;
b) Engage us on an ad-hoc basis, when required, charged at standard rates (get in touch for more).

If you have any questions, please do let us know.

Helpful Links:
Updating WordPress
Club Purple Membership
Making a Website Backup