HOW WE WORK
Learn More About Our Process
WordPress Security Projects
Discovery
This stage begins with an application that has many questions about what you are currently doing and helps us determine what your business needs are initially. This lets us know whether you need recovery and further hardening, or if you just need hardening and ongoing Security maintenance. It also tells us about your current WordPress Configuration and Flavor (Plugins, Themes, and External Services), so that we can create a solid proposal that is tailored to your site's needs. Within 24 hours of submittal of this application, we will be in contact with you to set up an introductory meeting that discusses what information we still need before finalizing our proposal. This also allows you to ask us questions and see if we are understanding your goals correctly.
Proposal
We will provide you with a proposal that outlines what we understand to be your goals, a road map to obtain them as well as what the schedule and budget would look like. This is the time to read through it and identify where adjustments need to be made. Once we are in agreement of your goals, roadmap, schedule and budget, we will invoice you for a start of work. We will determine your payment schedule prior to final sign off on acceptance of the proposal.
Recovery
If your site has been hacked, at this point we will recover the site and clean it of all malware. This may include backing up your database, wiping all the WordPress files, plugins and themes and reinstalling everything. It depends on how deep and prolific the malware is. In most cases, this is not necessary and it is very obvious what files are causing the problem.
Vulnerability Assessment and Mitigation
In this stage we will be assessing your site for vulnerabilities. We will compile a database of vulnerabilities and how they will be mitigated on your site. This will be a living database that will be updated during monthly Security Maintenance if a new vulnerability or a new mitigation for a current vulnerability is found.
Site Hardening
We will implement all the mitigations found that can be mitigated and implement workarounds for vulnerabilities that cannot be mitigated. This may involve custom coding, custom configurations of plugins/themes, substituting plugins/themes with loose coding practices with similar plugins/themes that adhere to secure coding guidelines. In addition, we will be removing plugins and themes that are inactive (with your approval) or not necessary for the functioning of your website. This is also the stage where we will be implementing SSL across your entire site.
Delivery and Training
Once the Hardening is completed we will assess your site again and run scans to ensure that our mitigations are holding up the way they are intended. At this point we will hand off your newly cleaned and hardened site to you and train you on any changes you will need to be aware of. We will also provide general online security awareness training that will introduce you to concepts you may have never thought about. In this training, we will also point you to tools and software that will help you integrate these new measures into your normal habits of working online.
WordPress Design Projects
Discovery
This stage begins with an application that has many questions about what you are currently doing and helps us determine what your business needs are. This lets us know whether you have a WordPress site that is in need of a redesign or if you are in the beginning stages of getting your business online. This also shows us specific gaps in your current site that may be the reason it is not performing the way you would like. All these questions give us an idea of what kind of work your project will entail and helps us build a better and more realistic proposal. We will be contacting you within 24 hours to set up an introductory meeting where we can get any information we still need before finalizing a proposal. This is also a good time for you to ask questions that ensure we are understanding your goals correctly.
Proposal
We will provide you with a proposal that outlines what we understand to be your goals, a road map to obtain them as well as what the schedule and budget would look like. This is the time to read through it and identify where adjustments need to be made. Once we are in agreement of your goals, roadmap, schedule and budget, we will invoice you for a start of work. We will determine your payment schedule prior to final sign off on acceptance of the proposal.
Sitemap
At this point we will know enough to begin laying out the structure of information for your site. We will either begin with your current sitemap or we will start with a new one based on the information provided to us. We will be collaborating with you until we have final sign off on the sitemap. Once this is done we can move onto the next stage and you will need to start gathering or creating your content package that we will need after putting all the necessary WordPress Plugin and Theme software required.
Prototype
We will create an interactive prototype of your new site. This will not have any of the frills or images that will be seen on the final site, but it will give you an idea of where certain information will appear.
Design
This is the fun part. In this stage we will be matching the color scheme of the agreed upon interactive prototype to the brand identity of your business. We will have three design reviews before the site design is finalized, we find that this is usually more than enough design reviews to hash out the final product.
Delivery and Training
Once your site is near the point of delivery, we will fully test the functionality of it and work out any bugs or issues that arise in testing. After testing, we will hand off your newly designed site to you and train you on any changes you will need to be aware of. WordPress 101 training videos will be provided in your WordPress dashboard in the case that you need more training on how to use WordPress. We will also provide general online security awareness training that will introduce you to concepts you may have never thought about. In this training, we will also point you to tools and software that will help you integrate these new measures into your normal habits of working online.