FREQUENTLY ASKED
QUESTIONS

The time it takes to build a website depends on a few different items. For instance, the size and complexity of your site, and the amount and quality of content you have available. Once all the required assets have been collected. You can plan on a basic website taking approximately 4 weeks from start to finish.

Absolutely!

I don’t write content for your site, but I can help you edit, update and format the content you provide me for your website.

I never want any of my clients to feel stranded after I  build their site. If you want to be able to make changes to your website after it launches I include an hour or two to walk through your WordPress dashboard and the Divi builder to help get you started.

A Content Management System (CMS) is a tool that allows you to maintain the pages of your website yourself, without any coding or specialized skills. A CMS allows you to edit content, add pages, insert images, and other administrative tasks. No additional software is required. All you need is an active internet connection.

There are a few common causes of a slow website. Two of the biggest are images that have not been optimized for web use and externally embedded media.

Full-sized images can consume a lot of a computer’s resources while loading. This can slow down your website on anyone’s browser. It’s important to take the time to resize your images for website use. Take a look at the image tag – it allows you to set the height and width. Be sure to scale the photos proportionally so that they don’t get stretched or skewed (which makes them look odd). Then, consider changing the image format, which can significantly reduce the file size. Finally, reduce image quality. That doesn’t mean making your photos look bad. It just means tweaking some simple settings (the quality needed for print is not the same quality needed for on-screen viewing). For JPG images, this is done by directly reducing the quality. In most cases, a quality setting of 80 to 90 percent will show no significant changes from the original version. In some cases, an image can go even lower depending on the type of image, the detail, and the colors. For other image formats such as GIF and PNG, you can reduce quality by opting for a smaller color palette.

For externally embedded media, I recommend avoiding this where possible. Once you embed someone else’s external material into your site, your pages will only run as fast as the other host’s site. In other words, if that external site is having a slow day, your site may run slow as well. That is not great for your website visitors. Whenever possible, it’s smart to host all content on your own server.

Plugins may also be causing issues. Just like external embedded media, plugins can bring in resources from other websites. I can perform some investigative work to see what plugins could be causing this outside of the typical monthly website care. Reach out for a quote for evaluation and plugin cleanup.

I hope so! While our plans are tailored for the websites I build, I am always happy to welcome new clients.

To ensure that I would be a good fit, I first have to look under the hood of your existing site. I need to get familiar with how it was built, understand the architecture, and if it poses any security risks or other issues. Included in this process, I will perform website updates, begin the monitoring tasks, and complete a full backup. Most importantly, I will make a list of issues to fix and suggestions for improvement needed in order to proceed with the website on the monthly plan of your choosing. This type of website evaluation is a fixed 2-hour fee.

For the health of your website, I ask that customers leave the updates to me. Website maintenance is an integral part of updating and keeping your site working properly. I take great care to first backup the website, then check the website, update files, and then check the website again for any changes. My software keeps a record of the files and plugins that I update so if there is ever an issue I can see what version was changed and are able to revert back to a clean version if necessary.

If a customer updates from their WordPress admin panel, I wouldn’t have that record. I update clients’ sites based on their care plan to ensure that I take the time to devote to checking your website thoroughly during the update process. Also included in my monthly maintenance reports are the security scans. If in the event I ever catch a plugin or software issue, it becomes a support ticket and I address it, hopefully before you are ever aware of it. I also take care about which plugins I am updating and single out large updates, such as WooCommerce if you have an online store, as its own task for additional quality control.

If your website is not loading on your end, first check to make sure this is the same experience for everyone at DownForEveryoneOrJustMe – http://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/.

If your website is down just for you, there are a few things that you can do. First, try clearing your browser history (cache and cookies) and reloading your website. Also, check your internet connection (as obvious as that might sound, we sometimes forget). If the website is down for everyone, shoot me a support ticket email, even though chances are that my website uptime monitor has already alerted me.

If this happens and I am not available, call the web host directly (e.g., Flywheel or GoDaddy) and see what they can do to get the website back online. Most likely, the cause of the outage is related to the following issues:

1. Your web hosting, domain, or SSL certificate has expired and payment is due
2. The web host is experiencing maintenance issues

Anything outside of these areas will be investigated by me in order to bring the site back online.

My website Maintenance and Care Plans are in place for just this reason, to prevent that from happening. However, I cannot guarantee that it won’t. What I can guarantee is that the preventive maintenance I provide with my care plans monitor your site regularly to keep security protocols in place to thwart any efforts to hack or otherwise break your site. I also will be prepared with full backups standing by at the ready to restore your site back to its pre-hacked status should a vulnerability be detected or create an issue.

If you received an email about your website files being compromised, make sure it is a legitimate email by calling your web hosting company and forwarding the email to me.

My next steps, as webmaster, is to reach out to your web host about their protocol for a compromised website and a scan on their end to confirm where the compromised files are on the server. Under your website care I will restore a clean backup of WordPress, and then take note from the web host about where the issue arose if it was outside of WordPress. This may mean the web host recommending a third-party service to clean up the compromised files or additional security (which could be at an additional fee to you).

The best way to prevent a compromised website is to keep WordPress and plugins up-to-date, which I do for you monthly under my Maintenance and Care Plans, as well as keep full backups to restore in the event of an issue. Unfortunately, just updating your website cannot guarantee that a hack won’t happen. This is why I help you work with the web host and third parties to restore your website in the event of a hack and institute security measures to prevent most known vulnerabilities by hackers.

I sure can! I work with you to understand what is and isn’t currently working for you and learn more about your business before I proceed. Please check out my Logo Design page for more information. If you’re interested in my logo refresh design services, I can quote you separately for the work.

I know that your logo will be used in a variety of mediums, not just on your website. I create my logos using the current version of the premium software, Adobe Illustrator. My final files are provided to you in a variety of formats, in a variety of sizes, and in a variety of resolutions so that you have what you need for website, print, email signature, letterhead, and any other use you may have. All of my finalized logo files include infinitely-scalable high-resolution vector-based PDF and vector files that can be sent directly to any print house.

I accept eTransfer (contact@richharrison.ca) and online card payments via WaveApp or Stripe.

My policy is 50% upfront, 25% on design approval and 25% prior to project handover. If you are requiring a more flexible payment plan, I am willing to work with a schedule that best works for you.

I prefer all correspondence be done via email. This ensures that all communication is in one location and to better ensure that information is not lost or missed. I will respond to most emails within the first 24-48 hours Monday to Friday. It will usually be sooner. contact@richharrison.ca

Scheduled Zoom meetings are available during initial discovery calls, training and upon request. In most cases these are conducted in the evening between 7-9pm Eastern Standard Time Monday – Thursday.

I do not accept correspondence through messenger or mobile text. These will be requested to be resent through email.

I am not contactable via phone unless one of my clients requires immediate assistance.