Virginia Website Maintenance Services

What is Involved in Maintaining Virginia Websites

We see web maintenance as a reactive support service where we provide your Virginia business with the right web developer resources to fix just about any problem. There are many examples of website issues that might require service from Virginia website support firms, including:

• Upgrading your website platform to the latest version.
• Updating apps and plugins to make them safer and more functional.
• Adding new web pages as you release new products or services.
• Freshen up your blog with new content.
• Rearranging the navigation menu of your Virginia website.
• Improve your page speed to pass Google Core Web Vitals.
• Take backups of your website's files and databases.
• Modifying the look and feel of your website's design.
• Fixing site audit issues or Google Search Console coverage problems.
• Adding structured data, open graph tags, etc.
• Investigating the cause and providing a solution to any other website issue.

Those services are just a taste of what Virginia web maintenance might look like. In fact, Virginia website maintenance is really anything a web developer or digital marketer does to your website to change it in some manner.

Reactive Virginia Website Support

Most Virginia website owners wouldn't want a web developer messing around with their site without their permission. That's why we consider web support a reactive service. When you choose to have our agency maintain your Virginia website, we'll be your web support team on standby for any request. There are some web maintenance services we can provide your Virginia website in a proactive manner though.

View Virginia Website Maintenance Pricing

Proactive Virginia Website Support

For website owners in Virginia interested in a proactive management service for some of their website upkeep requirements, we are happy to accommodate! We can take care of platform upgrades, app/extension updates, website backups, performance monitoring, and broken link monitoring as part of our proactive website management service.

View Virginia Website Management Pricing

Our website maintenance and support company is happy to provide Alexandria, Arlington, Chesapeake, Norfolk, Richmond, and Virginia Beach with fast website support services.

Who Needs Website Maintenance in Virginia

There will come a time when every Virginia website needs some sort of maintenance. The reason is simply that the internet is always changing. Not to worry though, our Virginia web support cost isn't expensive so it should be affordable for you to maintain your website! Website maintenance in Virginia might be needed for these reasons:

• When a hosting company upgrades their servers, they may remove older versions of PHP that your Virginia website was originally developed to support. That means you'll have to refactor your app or upgrade to a newer framework that supports the latest PHP release. You can't expect custom web functionality programmed in the past to work forever without any improvements.
• In order to focus on maintaining the newer version of an ecommerce platform or content management system, they eventually have to deprecate the previous releases. Magento 1.x store owners recently had to migrate to Magento 2.x, or an alternative ecommerce platform, because Magento 1.x was no longer maintained by Magento after it reached "End of Life". Virginia-area ecommerce businesses running Magento 1.x found themselves looking for an ecommerce developer to help migrate their store.
• When a website owner has become a victim of malware or some other form of malicious activity, the Virginia website will need to be reviewed for security exploits and cleaned of malware. In most cases, this happens because the website owner didn't pay attention to the first two website support examples.
• When the content on your Virginia website, which explains your organization, products, or services becomes outdated and needs to be refreshed to help ensure future visitors receive accurate information about your operation. Keeping your Virginia website up to date is key to its success.

As you can see, there are many reasons a website may require maintenance above and beyond the obvious reasons of just wanting to update something on the website. When planning budgets and schedules for web maintenance and support, consider your Virginia business's potential future needs.

How We Perform Virginia Web Maintenance

It's our job to understand your website maintenance needs, schedule your work in a timely fashion, and follow up with your Virginia business after the work is done.

Most web support services start with an email from you, the owner of the Virginia website. That email is routed into our ticket system and automatically assigned to the project manager on your account. Anyone on our team can work on the ticket without delay, resulting in faster turnaround time.

For requests that originate from phone or live chat, a similar process to handling your Virginia website support services unfolds. A support request is entered into our ticket system by the person in the conversation with you, so the work order can be routed to the right web developer.

Example Web Maintenance Service List for Virginia Businesses

After the launch of a website, we're often asked for detailed examples of Virginia website maintenance requests. Here are several examples of Virginia web support services we've been asked to perform in the past and would be more than happy to provide to you!

Simple Virginia Website Changes

Your Virginia website might need a paragraph updated, an image changed, or a new page added. These are just normal, routine website support tasks to keep content fresh for both search engines and visitors.

Virginia Website Speed Improvements

If your Virginia website isn't running as fast as it once was, we can review your website for hosting issues, caching issues, unoptimized images, console errors, broken links, poor queries, and much more. It'll help improve page load times, which will make users and search engines happy.

Platform Upgrades / Security Updates

If your Virginia website is running on a content management system, like WordPress, it is important to keep the platform updated. This helps improve security and functionality - sometimes the updates are relatively quick to perform, which is a win-win!

Plugin / Extension Upgrades

If your Virginia website has functionality developed and maintained by a third-party, it is important to update those plugins and extensions to include the latest changes by the developers. The idea is similar to updating the CMS platform since it fixes security and functionality problems.

Google Search Console Fixes

Has Google Search Console told you there's a coverage problem? If so, we'll look at the coverage issues, fix them, and update you on the status. This will help your search engine rankings, throughout Virginia and beyond, by making Google happy!

Setup Structured Data

Do you ever see product prices or reviews in Google organic search results? This is brought to you by structured data, which is a standardized way of describing the content on the web page, whether it be of a local business in Virginia, and ecommerce product or some other common data type.

Add Open Graph to Your Website

Adding Open Graph Tags to your website will help search engines better understand your page content and improve the appearance of your website in social media platforms when people share links of your Virginia business.

Implement Google Tag Manager

Interested in using Google Tag Manager for managing custom scripts? Not a problem! We can add Google Tag Manager to your Virginia website and even give you a crash course in using Google Tag Manager.

Add Conversion Tracking

If you are interested in understanding the benefit of an online advertising campaign for your Virginia website, it is important to setup conversion tracking. It'll help you understand where your conversions come from, like direct traffic, referral links, organic search, or paid ads.

Optimize Images

Do you have a Virginia website that's slow because of large images? That won't be a problem! We can run all your images through our image compression tools and even setup recurring image compression for newly added images in the future!

Setup Live Chat

Would you like to try live chat? We can make recommendations on the best live chat systems for your business requirements, install the tracking code, and configure the design to match the branding of your Virginia business!

Review Error Logs for Issues

Have you noticed large error_log files on your hosting account? If you're getting recurring error messages, we can update programming code or fix platform issues.

Integrate reCaptcha on Contact Forms

If spambots are attacking your Virginia website, we can setup a checkbox or invisible reCaptcha to help minimize unwanted submissions on your forms.

Setup a Caching Plugin

Are you interested in installing a caching plugin in your Virginia website, but not sure how to properly configure the settings for best website performance? We can help recommend caching plugins, or just install and configure them for you!

Setup SMTP Email

To help improve email deliverability, we can configure your contact form and website platform to send emails through an SMTP account instead of PHP mail.

Restrict IP Addresses

Is your Virginia website being bombarded with fake orders, contact submissions or live chats from a specific network? We can help setup IP restrictions to prevent malicious traffic from interacting with your website.

Create Website Backups

Do you want to create a backup of your Virginia website? We can help you create one-time or scheduled backups that store locally or at an offsite location.

Create a Development Website

It is often recommended that you setup a development or staging website before proceeding with a major upgrade or extension installation. If you'd like help creating and managing that development / staging site, just let us know!

Implement A/B Testing

Do you prefer to make design changes based on statistical data regarding how users interact with your Virginia web page? If so, we can help you implement A/B testing to gather data to help inform you of the best choice between two or more design layouts.

Create 301 Redirects

Are you launching a new website or removing pages from your website? You should create 301 redirects for your Virginia website. We've seen businesses in and around Virginia lose huge amounts of organic traffic due to widespread broken pages. We can help you create 301 redirects within .htaccess files, nginx templates, and CMS platforms.

Provide Website Training

Do you need help learning how to make changes to your Virginia website? If your Virginia site was developed in a platform we work within, such as WordPress or Shopify, we'll be happy to help!

The Platforms We Maintain for Virginia Websites

With years of experience developing websites for Virginia businesses (and those in other areas of the country), our web designers and web developers have been immersed in multiple platforms. That said, it is better to become a master of a handful of platforms rather than try to specialize in them all. For that reason, our web maintenance agency for Virginia websites tends to service only the following platforms:

• Virginia WordPress Website Maintenance
• Virginia WooCommerce Web Support
• Virginia Shopify Website Support

As a web maintenance firm, we used to maintain and support Joomla and Magento websites for Virginia-area businesses. However, we chose to move away from those platforms to allow our web support experts to focus more heavily on training and support within the other systems.

Questions to Ask Virginia Website Support Firms

Ask the Virginia web maintenance company some questions about their services before you sign up for a package. This will help you get a better idea of the relationship you will have with the Virginia website maintenance team before you give them money, provide them website access, and give them complete access to your website for one of their web support packages. Let's go over some simple questions to ask:

• What kind of security do you have on your site? Do you scan client websites for security?
• What is the turnaround time for Virginia website support requests?
• Are you outsourcing your Virginia web maintenance services?
• What are your Virginia website maintenance costs?
• Are there minimum deductions or minimum billable expenses for Virginia website updates?
• At what times of the day are you working and able to take our maintenance requests?
• Will you keep me informed about new updates within my platform?

We find it beneficial to run these questions by any Virginia website services agency before subscribing to their website support packages, since it will provide much better understanding for you regarding the future relationship, the security of your website, and the expected turnaround time for important maintenance requests.

Virginia Web Maintenance Plans and Tips

Companies in and around Virginia often ask us for a web maintenance plan to establish routines and procedures. We are happy to help your Virginia business develop a website maintenance plan to ensure all aspects of your website, hosting, and domain name are routinely checked to ensure optimum performance and uptime.

Here is a list of annual Virginia web support tasks to review:

• Check if your web hosting provider has newer servers that your account can be migrated to.
• Check if your website platform has a new major release that will require an extensive website migration.
• Restore a website backup to make sure the data is enough for full recovery. Also, make sure your backups are stored remotely.
• Look at competitor websites (even those outside of Virginia) to see if you are missing out on new functionality for your own customers.
• Take a look at your website's security to make sure nothing's been compromised.
• Ensure that structured data, open graph, and social links are all working.
• Verify the necessity of any 3rd party tracking, live chat, or heat map scripts that are installed.
• Remove any unnecessary development or staging websites.

Check out this list of semi-annual Virginia website support tasks to review:

• Ensure you have access to your domain name and that it isn't expiring soon. This will be helpful when you have to process a domain name renewal.
• Check your hosting account credentials and make sure it's not about to expire.
• Ensure you have access to your DNS in case you need to change anything.
• Make sure your SSL certificate isn't expiring soon.
• Make sure you have remote backups outside Virginia and that your website backup schedule is working.
• Check if you have an automated image optimization service running.
• Check if the website is throwing any console errors.

Check out this list of monthly Virginia web maintenance tasks to consider:

• Check for broken links on your website, which negatively impact user experience and SEO.
• Make sure your website isn't having performance issues after recent updates.
• Check Google Search Console for any coverage issues.
• Keep your website fresh by updating your content within one of your service pages or blog articles.
• Take a look at your website platform and extensions for any available updates.

The Cost of Website Maintenance Service in Virginia

The starting price for our Virginia website maintenance services is $119.50/hour, but we offer discounts for pre-purchased blocks of time that bring the rate as low as $99.95/hour. We also offer website management for Virginia websites, starting at $50/month, if you'd like the peace of mind knowing a company is proactively upgrading your site.

To get started, if you are new to our web maintenance company, we'll need you to pre-purchase a block of time which includes a discount on our hourly rate. If you are an existing client in Virginia, you are welcome to choose monthly billing at our higher hourly rate or continue to pre-purchase time and receive discounted hourly rates for your website updates.

If you pre-purchase a block of time for your Virginia web maintenance services, you will be happy to know there are no contracts, there are no hidden fees, the time never expires, and there are no minimum deductions for small website update requests. Please keep in mind we rarely see tasks take less than 10 minutes, since the process of reviewing an email or taking a phone call, checking on whatever was asked, providing some form of feedback, and then logging the task usually takes at least 10 minutes of time. To keep you informed of the time usage on your pre-purchased block of web maintenance time, you will receive a monthly email update letting you know how much time remains on your account.

What is Considered Billable Time?

When talking with prospective Virginia website maintenance clients, we are often asked what is considered billable time. You will find the answers to vary greatly within the website support industry. In some situations, you may find a website maintenance company in Virginia to charge a much higher hourly rate, but not bill out for communication and organization. Likewise, there are website support companies in Virginia who charge a more affordable hourly rate, but also bill out for most communication and organization. This is the approach we take. To help provide clarification, let's go over some examples of what we consider billable time when it comes to maintaining and supporting your Virginia website.

Here are examples of what is considered billable time:

• Reading through lengthy emails to understand what is being requested.
• Preparing responses to lengthy or complex email messages.
• Helping you figure out your domain name or web hosting provider.
• Scheduling your website maintenance to be completed by the best team member.
• Talking with you on the phone about ideas or tasks you want to discuss.
• Reviewing completed work for quality control purposes.
• Providing you training on how to handle administrative tasks.
• Researching unique solutions to difficult questions you present our team.
• Providing more detailed time usage reports, beyond the automated monthly update email.
• Helping you figure out email client issues within Microsoft Outlook, Apple Mail, etc.
• Almost any other task not specifically mentioned in the list below.

Here are examples of what is not considered billable time:

• Talking with you about personal matters, such as the weather, a recent vacation, or a sporting event.
• Responding to simple email messages that don't require research or lengthy feedback.
• Handling accounting-related tasks, such as invoice generation, payment confirmations, etc.

Web Support Services throughout Virginia

If you've been searching for experienced website maintenance and support companies serving major cities throughout Virginia, we'll be the web maintenance team you want to contact. Our web maintenance experts frequently offer website maintenance and help in Alexandria, Arlington, Chesapeake, Norfolk, Richmond, or Virginia Beach throughout Virginia. From simple website updates and platform upgrades, to website training and emergency support, our web support agency will have you covered!

When looking for website experts to handle website maintenance and support in smaller cities throughout Virginia, we still hope you'll consider our web maintenance services. We have a full staff of dedicated website experts ready to help Virginia-area businesses. Whether your business is located in Annandale, Baileys Crossroads, Blacksburg, Burke, Cave Spring, Chantilly, Charlottesville, Dale City, Danville, Franconia, Lake Ridge, Lynchburg, Manassas, Mechanicsville, Petersburg, Portsmouth, Reston, Roanoke, Springfield, Suffolk, Woodbridge, or a different city, our website maintenance agency will be ready to help with all your Virginia website support services!

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