Maintenance & support without the drama
Monthly retainers that keep your website or app patched, monitored, backed up and quietly improving — with response times written in plain English and a senior team on the other end, even for systems we didn’t build.
How we approach it
Software doesn’t stay finished. Dependencies age, security vulnerabilities are published weekly, browsers change, and the plugin that worked fine last year quietly breaks something today. Most businesses only discover this when the site goes down or gets compromised — usually at the worst possible moment. Our maintenance retainers exist so that never happens: the unglamorous work of patching, updating, monitoring and backing up gets done every month, on schedule, by senior engineers who’ve run production systems at AWS and Ticketmaster scale.
A retainer covers the fundamentals as standard: security patches applied promptly, dependency and framework updates tested on staging before they touch production, uptime monitoring that alerts us before your customers notice, automated off-site backups we actually test restoring, and periodic performance audits so the site that launched fast stays fast. You get a short monthly report in plain English — what we did, what we found, what we recommend — not a wall of jargon.
Our service levels are written the same way. Instead of legal boilerplate, your agreement says things like “critical issues acknowledged within one hour during business hours, worked on until resolved” — commitments you can actually hold us to. And you don’t need to have built with us to get this: we regularly take on WordPress sites, Shopify stores, and React or Node applications built by other agencies or departed freelancers. We start those engagements with a technical audit so we know exactly what we’re taking responsibility for.
The bigger payoff is what a retainer prevents: the big, risky rebuild. Sites that receive small, continuous improvements — a faster template here, a clearer form there, a dependency upgrade before it becomes a cliff edge — rarely need to be thrown away and rebuilt from scratch. Retainer hours can be spent on those improvements, not just firefighting. Fixed monthly pricing, agreed upfront, no lock-in beyond the notice period, and a free 30-minute call to scope what your system needs.
Maintenance & Support, done properly
Security patching
Vulnerabilities in frameworks, plugins and dependencies patched promptly, with critical fixes fast-tracked — before they become the reason you’re in the news.
Updates tested, then shipped
Framework and dependency updates applied on a staging copy first, tested, then released — so an upgrade never takes your live site down.
Uptime monitoring & alerts
Automated checks around the clock that alert us the moment your site or app misbehaves — usually before your customers ever notice.
Backups you can trust
Automated, off-site backups with retention that suits your business — and we periodically test restores, because an untested backup is just hope.
Performance audits
Regular Core Web Vitals and speed reviews on real devices, with fixes shipped from your retainer so the site that launched fast stays fast.
Continuous small improvements
Retainer time spent shipping useful changes — clearer forms, faster pages, small features — so the system improves monthly instead of decaying towards a rebuild.
From first call to launch
- 01
Audit
We review your codebase, hosting, dependencies and backups — whoever built them — and give you an honest written picture of the risks before we take responsibility.
- 02
Agree the plan
A fixed monthly price, a plain-English service agreement with response times, and a prioritised list of what needs fixing first. No lock-in beyond the notice period.
- 03
Stabilise
The first weeks fix the urgent findings: outstanding patches, broken backups, missing monitoring. Your system reaches a known-good, documented baseline.
- 04
Maintain & improve
Monthly patching, updates and monitoring as routine, remaining hours spent on improvements you choose — with a short plain-English report each month.
Maintenance & Support questions, answered
Can you support a website or app you didn’t build?
Yes — a large share of our support work is inherited systems: WordPress and Shopify sites from other agencies, React and Node applications from freelancers who’ve moved on. We start with a technical audit covering code quality, hosting, dependencies, backups and security, so both sides know exactly what we’re taking on. You get that audit in writing whether or not you proceed with a retainer.
What does a maintenance retainer include?
Every retainer covers security patching, dependency and framework updates tested on staging, uptime monitoring with alerting, automated off-site backups with tested restores, and periodic performance audits. Remaining hours go on improvements you choose — content changes, small features, speed work. You get a short monthly report in plain English describing what was done and what we recommend next.
What are your response times?
They’re written into your agreement in plain English, not buried in legal boilerplate. Typically: critical issues — site down, security breach, checkout broken — acknowledged within one hour during business hours and worked on until resolved; important issues within one business day; routine requests scheduled into the monthly cycle. If you need out-of-hours cover, we scope and price that explicitly rather than implying it.
How much does support cost?
Retainers are priced fixed per month based on the size and complexity of what we’re supporting — a brochure site needs far less than a trading eCommerce store or a custom application. We agree the monthly price and what it covers in writing after a free 30-minute scoping call, and there’s no lock-in beyond a notice period. Unused improvement hours are handled fairly and agreed upfront.
Why maintain continuously instead of rebuilding every few years?
Because the every-few-years rebuild is the most expensive and risky way to run a website. Systems that get continuous small updates — dependencies kept current, performance kept fast, improvements shipped monthly — rarely reach the point where scrapping them is the only option. Continuous maintenance spreads cost predictably, avoids the SEO and downtime risks of big-bang launches, and means your site is always its best current version.
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Let's talk about your project
Tell us what you're trying to achieve. A free 30-minute chat, no obligation — we'll tell you honestly what we'd recommend and what it would cost.