Your WordPress website's security is really, really, really important.

I love WordPress. It gives small entrepreneurs the power to create and manage their own websites and blogs and that is incredible.

Remember back in the day when you had to have a WebMaster? It was a while ago, so maybe you don’t remember. It’s pretty unheard of for small businesses to have one anymore. While it’s a good thing that people can manage their own sites, in my experience, even with the best of intentions, a website can sit on the back burner if you’re not regularly blogging or using it for any online marketing.

And here in lies the problem: You stop logging into your site. You stop backing it up and updating the software. Then you get hacked.

Hackers are just getting better and faster.

Over the holiday, more than 100,000 WordPress sites were hacked into because of a weakness in a slider software (a plugin). Three of my previous client’s sites were hacked, 2 blacklisted and it took a a lot of time and money to get everything fixed. It was the most stressful thing that’s ever happened to my business in the almost 5 years I’ve been self-employed.

Here’s the thing: if you have a WordPress site and you’re not logging in weekly to update it, hire someone to do it for you. Today. (I do it – email me for info, my plans start at $85/mo. Or you can try one of these companies.)

Of course, there is never a 100% guarantee you can keep your site from being hacked. But if you’re keeping it updated weekly, you’re doing the most important thing to protect your site.

Here’s the other things I recommend you do:

1. Make a plan to upgrade your hosting this year. A little bit more money per mo. can go a long way to protecting your site, i.e. piece of mind.

Hosts with Managed WP hosting: (you can click here to read more about the pros/cons and read about other providers)

• FlyWheel (I’m in the process of moving all of my own sites here)
• BlueHost’s WP Hosting (not their regular plan) – Use only if you don’t think you’ll need frequent customer support.
• WP Engine

2. Use Google Apps for your email.

Why use Google apps for yourdomain.com email? Avoid spam. Avoid being blacklisted. Next-to-no downtime. (Yes, you can still use your email client of choice: apple mail, outlook, etc.)

• You can read more about the benefits here.
• Or you can read more pros and see how to set it up here.

3. If you don’t want to use any of my other recommendations: use Sucuri.

While this has been a crazy time for me, I know that this will only lead me to serve my clients better and I hope this post helps you.