Amongst IT professionals it’s a recognised fact that a backup is not a backup unless it is automated. Left to human responsibility and intervention reliability becomes the issue, often because of time constraints.
And WordPress websites are no different – they need backing up regularly, preferably on a daily basis, with a rolling 30 day cycle. So what are the options?
Well, if you’re still not convinced you need an automated backup routine for your WordPress web site you could do it manually either using a two-step process – first backing up the database attached to your WordPress install usually using the MySQL dump function, then secondly using FTP (File Transfer Protocol) to download your plugins, themes and media content. You will also need to backup your plugins and theme folders every time you do a plugin and/or theme upgrade. But be assured most small businesses will need training to do this, and find it very time consuming, and therein lies the problem – it just gets left as other business imperatives take priority, and before you know it backups just aren’t happening.
A slightly better solution would be to use a free WordPress backup plugin, which automates the process to a certain extent, but these still require the web site owner to login to the admin panel to initiate the backup. True, it takes away the time-consuming process mentioned in the previous paragraph, but it still relies on human intervention.
A third way, which will provide an automated backup solution, is to go for a premium (paid for) plugin which will provide automation; this is a huge step forward and takes care of the scheduled backups. What it doesn’t do is run security checks for plugin/theme updates. Web site owners still need to check for these and initiate a backup before doing the plugin and theme upgrades.
Alternatively, fully managed WordPress web hosting is becoming more and more popular. For a set monthly fee the managed service will take care of the backup process; this usually involves backing up the web site content i.e. all your pages, posts, image and other media content such as PDF and Word documents on a daily basis.
Also, as part of security practice, a managed service will take backups before plugin and theme updates are implemented. This is extremely important, as plugin updates may cause errors which can bring a web site down, so being able to restore the old version of a plugin allows investigations to be made into the cause of the new plugin failure whilst the site remains live. Likewise, if there is a conflict between the plugin upgrade and an existing plugin. This type of service is usually classed as premium hosting and because of extra storage capacity and system monitoring comes with a premium price tag.
Here at Octagon Technology we offer both an unsupported WordPress web hosting service, although we do recommend our WordPress web hosting managed service for all the above reasons.
Alex
Alex provides web support for Octagon Technology and their clients including hosting and domains administration as well as advice and assistance with WordPress installation, security and maintenance.
If you would like to talk to Alex about any hosting or WordPress matters, please let me know and I will ask him to contact you and answer your questions.
Kamila
General Manager
Octagon Technology Ltd
