Originally Published on : February, 27 – 2018
Updated on: April 29 – 2022

With today’s proliferation of various systems that allow you to “create a website” for yourself, that is, without the help of “nobody”, there is a tendency to think that it will always be like this, and that we will never need another person to handle it, but my dear reader, allow me to explain you why your Website Needs Technical Support.

You might know that there are several solutions like Blogger, CMSs, or Content Management Systems, Wix or other “all-in-one” solutions. Usually, people tend to think that when they build a new website, the process is complete once the site is fully up and running, but they are completely wrong. I am sorry that I have to say this, but’s completely true.

Web technologies are composed of many elements, some of them big and other smaller. No matter the technology that your website is built, it’s formed by many pieces working together.

When we start our journey having our first website is that we start listening about names and concepts that before we were not aware that they exist. Things like domain name, servers, DNS, hosting packages, site setup, HTML, CSS, CMS, PHP, JavaScript, ICANN and many more components. All of these things are present on each modern website that you see on the Internet.

SOME DETAILS

The first thing that we need to know or understand is that your website is living on the Internet, which is subject to constant changes, whether as a consequence of your actions or the environment in which it lives. Have you heard the term: surfing on the web? Why do people use that term? Well, it comes from one of the concepts in which the World Wide Web (WWW) was built back in 1989 by Tim Berners Lee who created it and made it public in 1991.

When you are on the Internet, you are not alone. It’s the biggest community of people in the world. It’s like being in a superhighway (EL) where there are many vehicles, like being in the ocean, when you surf the web, or like being in the sky, hence the term the Cloud.

Most people think that when they visit a website it’s something very simple. But what the users don’t realize is what the system looks like behind the scene; and what appears to be quite simple to use it’s indeed a very complex system that needs attention.

Most users are unaware of the maintenance effort required to keep everything up to date and running smoothly. Website visitors just expect things to work well and fast, but for a website owner, maintenance is definitely something that needs attention. Whether you do it by yourself or have a professional company manage your website for you, it does need to get done. If not, very bad things will happen later sooner.

Thinking that we will not need a technical support in our new websites is like thinking that we don’t need gas, a mechanic, a cleaning service, life insurance, data plate and other things when we buy a new car. It’s exactly like that and even more.

Your Website Needs Support

It does not matter what kind of website you have, small or big; every website needs maintenance. Maintaining your website yourself can be done if you understand the technical details and have the time to find and analyze errors that might have a negative impact on the performance of your website. You can also do it if you are able to fix glitches that may be introduced when a website theme, content management system, or plugin gets updated, or able to step in quickly when a security patch is required at very short notice. However, getting to know all of these things takes years to master.

The most valuable thing: Time

Even if you have the necessary skills or technical knowledge, most business owners DO NOT HAVE THE TIME to do it because they are busy running their business, that is the most important thing and that is really what they have to take care of. It is therefore a lot more convenient and effective to have someone else who is familiar with these tasks taking care of your website support. This saves you time, ensures thing get done and lets you focus on core business activities.

Here I am going to present you some key elements that will give you a clear understanding why you MUST have a professional Technical Support team. Note that I didn’t say “that you have to consider having a tech team”, but that you must have it.

There are several aspects that need constant updates and maintenance to ensure your website performs properly and stays error-free. Let’s go over some important aspects that need regular maintenance below. At LFStudio we take all of these things very seriously. For us, your website is your business, and your business represents everything.

What can (or will) happen?

When a website is not maintained regularly, small problems will appear in the backend, and sooner or later they will appear in the front-end, I mean, in what is visible to your visitors.

01- Your website will break

It’s hard to accept, but your website will break, no matter what.

Sometimes web browsers like Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, etc., update their software, with no warning, and parts of your website might look weird because of that update. Perhaps there is a plugin on your website that is outdated, or no longer supported by its creator, or simply that it was hacked and it’s redirecting your website traffic to inappropriate content or somewhere else.

Even though this behavior is bad, this is a nice scenario. Why? Because most of the time hacked websites are the target of identity theft. Other thing that normally happens in a situation like this is that you get a blank screen with an error. This situation also happens when there is a problem in your database.

02- Your site is slow

Slower websites and errors in turn can result in lower Google ranking and visitors leaving your website early because pages take too long to load or just don’t work properly. Monitoring your website’s performance is crucial today.

03- Components update

As I said before, there are many components in any website. You need to take care about them. Usually there are plugins that gets updated by its creator, but they don’t update automatically on your website, and you can get into trouble. It prevents your site from getting hacked.

Other thing that goes by hand with this is that even though there is an update for XYZ plugin, it might conflict with another plugin or even with your framework. So it’s the technical support professional who has to take care of this. He will take the time to analyze the scenario and make all the necessary tests in order for not to compromise your website.

Unpatched software used by your website may result in your website becoming an easier target for hackers, with big performance issues, possibly becoming a malware or ransomware distribution point and risking complete removal from Google’s search index.

04- Security

Security is a MUST in every field of humanity. So is to websites. Malware can be extremely damaging to your website, and therefore your company. Most of the time you will not even notice that malware is installed on your website, collecting personal and sensitive data. Protecting a website from malware and removal when found has become an almost constant area of attention.

Firewall

By implementing a firewall, you ensure your website has the best chance of blocking hackers so that they do not exploit vulnerabilities. This is something that is very important to every website. Additionally, a firewall will also make your website faster by cutting out unwanted, malicious traffic.

05- Website monitoring and troubleshooting

If you monitor your website regularly, you will detect problems on it quicker. This gives you the opportunity to troubleshoot and fix those problems in their early stages, before things get worse.

06- Web server administration

The server hosting your website also needs attention. Usually you have two main areas: The FTP (File Transfer Protocol) and the CPanel or Control Panel. Think that your website is a building, well, the CPanel is the area that runs and manages that entire building. It’s the place to handle the server. It has many components and your website(s) are only one of those components. It’s also the place where emails are created. The operating system and software components needed for your website to run are also managed here. They also need to be kept up to date.

07- Backups

Imagine that you have a couple of years working on your website and that you feel proud of it, and suddenly, it gets corrupted or even worse, it gets hacked. You don’t know what to say, what to do or where to go.

Backups are also essential in case of a more critical failure or if things do not go as planned after a software update. Being able to restore your website to a previous working state is an important aspect.

Something very important that you must understand is that backups must be done frequently. It’s almost useless to have an obsolete backup. In addition, backups must be tested to confirm that they work correctly. It is not creating them like that. You have to test them on a separate testing server to verify their proper functioning. This ensures that it can be useful if necessary. We know how to do this.

08- Web server migration

Over time, your website may need to migrate to a different server. One reason is that the server will become outdated and reach an End of Life stage. Another is that more resources are required that cannot be satisfied by the current server, or simply that you find it expensive. This last reason must be thought and analyzed very deeply.

Migrating to a new server can be quite complex. Hiring a professional to do this avoids unnecessary downtime and makes sure your website is fully functional on the new server with minimal impact to your business. Sometimes is not only moving the website to a new destination, the real and big problem comes with moving the email system and all the consequences that it can bring.

09- SEO

When you create quality content and apply SEO rules on it, your website will rank higher on Google and other search engines. It also keeps people interested and keeps your business present in their minds. SEO is a huge field in the the web today. It’s simply essential in your business. Simply put: When your customer is looking for the services that you provide, he will go to Google and search for those services, NOT for you. What Google will show to your customers are two options:

a) Your competition that pay ads to Google, or
b) Your competition that hires a good SEO professional.

So, it’s your decision. By the way, your customer will not go beyond the first page on Google. 99% of the time, they choose a provider that appears on the first page of Google results. You have to decide. It’s like saying: Or you appear in the first page, or your business does not exist. At LFStudio we help you to appear on the first page.

10- Social Media

Social media marketing is a powerful and effective marketing tool because it allows the audience to engage with the content that an organization or company produces.

The community manager arguably plays the most important role in a social media marketing strategy as he/she engages with the organization’s audience on a daily basis. It is essential that as the online audience responds to posts and openly voices their personal experiences with the organization, a community manager is present to rapidly reply to audience feedback in a way that enables the audience to feel positive about your company. A consumer’s good feelings can thus provoke repeat purchase and loyalty.

The most important thing on all of this about Social Media, is that they allow your business to be exposed to a massive audience. And it takes a lot of time managing in a successful way all the available channels that we have today. Just imagine having to create high quality content, post it on the different channels, and then having to check the interactions on your video channel, YouTube, Vimeo, etc., the comments on your blog, the questions and conversations in Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and more. The amount of things that we have to do today is overwhelming. No matter how smart, fast, focused you are, you can’t do it alone. You need help.   We offer you service plans to take care of all this difficult part to do.

CONCLUSION

Your time is valuable.

You have to focus your expertise on your own field, not in the technical aspects of running a website. A quality support team has the knowledge and skills to stay aware of the latest trends in web technology. They can and will provide all the help that your website needs even before you know it. They are able to see the problem in its real dimension and provide a timely and correct solution.

“6 months of advance on Internet represents 100 years in ANY other industry or field.”

You deserve to be in peace

Having to worry about Internet and website technologies is stressful and time consuming. A quality support team alleviates that stress and gives you peace of mind in order for you to focus on your business. I personally know quite some people that they don’t know how to put together a website, but they manage their business from home, from their website and they make more than 10 millions of dollars every single year. Why? Because they concentrate in what they know best that is their online business and hire a professional support team to handle the hard stuff.

As you can see, there are no real shortcuts to website support which involves quite a lot of work to fit into your daily schedule. Of course you can do it all in-house, but if you do not have the time to dedicate to constant support and maintenance; your best bet would be to let someone else take over.

Having a company cover your website support makes sure things get done and done on time. This will keep your website up and running with optimized functionality and safety. It also lets you dedicate more time to your business, and the most important: it will give you TIME.

Please, allow us at LFStudio, to help you.