In this article, I’ll share with you 10 business process examples for your WordPress business.
Getting into the habit of creating a written process for each WordPress problem that you solve is really good practice.
You’ll save time in the future (solving the same issue).
You’ll onboard team members faster (they won’t have to come to you with questions).
Above all, your clients will receive a more efficient service (you’ll get things done quicker).
I learned about the importance of creating processes very early on in business – yet it took me years before I actually started implementing them properly.
It was a guy called Dave Jenyns at systemHUB that triggered it for me.
Like I said, I’d read about them for years but I guess had never seen it all framed as well before.
So, Dave, if you read this, thank you!
Boy has it made a difference since I started implementing them.
We have processes for everything at Glow … and I mean everything.
Having been in your shoes as a WordPress developer managing multiple sites, I thought it’d be really handy to share some business process examples that worked for me over the years.
I’ll start by looking at what a process is.
After that, we’ll dive into those 10 business process examples.
An intro to processes
At Glow, we like to think of processes as mini ‘how to’ guides for how you do everything in your business.
They should improve the efficiency of your business by cutting down the time it takes to perform regular tasks and reducing the amount of mistakes or errors that occur.
A double whammy of goodness for both you and your clients.
Start by brainstorming with your team on all of the tasks that you perform regularly in the day to day work – make a list.
In addition, you should also create a process for problems that you solve – the same WordPress issues crop up all over the place and solving them is an awful lot less of a headache when you’ve got your own little step by step guide.
Finally, you should have client-specific processes.
Each WordPress website is different from the next and if you’re managing lots of them, it’s very likely that clients ask you to support them with the same things over and over.
Write these down as processes and your team will get things done in a few minutes instead of a couple of hours …. more efficiency for your clients, higher profit margins for you.
We use an app called Notion for creating our processes.
There’s others of course, we just find Notion so easy and powerful – particularly the ease of finding documents and jumping in and out of each one – way faster than Google Drive for example.
Right, now let’s dive into the business process examples I promised you:
10 business process examples for WordPress maintenance
Hopefully this list will inspire you to think of others and get you started with implementing processes in your business.
#1 How often do you check for WordPress updates
Generally speaking, you know that WordPress updates (core, plugins and themes) should be performed as regularly as possible.
However, you might for example carry out checks more often for those clients that are paying you a higher monthly fee.
So how does this look for your business? Do you check for updates daily? Maybe it’s weekly or even monthly?
Whatever it is, write it down, including the steps on how you actually perform the updates.
#2 Updating plugins
One of the most time consuming aspects of WordPress maintenance – updating plugins.
Unless you have a Glow account of course 🙂
The more clients you have, the more of these there are to do.
So how does this look in your business?
What steps do you go through to update them all?
Do you always perform a full site backup beforehand?
Do you check the sites over afterwards to make sure there are no errors?
Whatever you do, write it down in an easy to follow process.
#3 Performing a website audit
It’s good practice when onboarding a new website maintenance client to perform an audit of the website.
This is particularly true if you didn’t build the website.
So, how do you and your team perform yours?
Do you clean up the spam?
Remove any inactive plugins perhaps?
How long should it take?
Do you inform your client once it’s been completed, along with a report on your findings?
Whatever you do, write down the step by step guide.
#4 Premium plugin licenses – how are these handled?
WordPress updates of premium plugins are slightly different to free ones.
As you know, licenses are often required.
Do you handle these yourselves and bill the client?
Or does your client hold the license and therefore you need to retrieve the license key from them?
Where do you securely store the license keys in case they’re needed in future?
Get it all documented and future premium plugin updates will be a doddle.
#5 Checking for broken links
This is a great value add service to provide to clients, particularly those with larger sites.
Broken links are a terrible experience for website visitors and can lead to lost conversions.
Which software do you use to check for broken links?
How do you report to clients on those that you found and fixed?
How often do you check?
Do you only do this for clients on your highest maintenance plans?
However this looks for your business, document it nice and clearly.
#6 Informing a client they’ve used up their time
It’s common to allow clients a certain amount of time each month for changes and fixes on their website.
I’m sure you’ll have something similar in place for your clients.
Do you roll over their time allowance if they don’t use it?
Or do your clients ‘use it or lose it’?
What if they exceed it by 30 mins, do you bill them automatically or send them an invoice at the end of the month?
How much time does a client get on your lowest maintenance plan vs the highest?
However this looks for your business, write down the process for informing the client.
#7 Scheduling website backups
We all know the importance of website backups.
Your hosting company should be providing them daily and it’s always good practice to have them setup and running elsewhere.
So where do you do that?
How do you customise the settings for how regularly they run for each client?
Do clients that pay you higher monthly fees get more regular backups?
However it works for you, clearly document the process in your wiki.
#8 How to setup a free SSL certificate for a client
SSL certificates range in scope.
Some you pay for.
On the other hand, some you don’t.
The free Let’s Encrypt SSL is extremely popular now and if you’re onboarding a new client with an insecure site (yes they still exist, crazy right?) then having a solid process for how you install this could be really helpful.
#9 What is the standard auto-response for client support requests
Auto-replies are a crucial part of website maintenance.
When a client raises an issue, they should get an immediate, automated response from you, explaining that you’ve got their message and are looking into it.
So what does this message look like for you?
Do you have a standard response time?
If so, make sure that’s mentioned.
In addition, make sure it’s on-brand, not robot-sounding.
We’ve all experienced this pain with clients.
They get in touch to let you know they’ve not had a website enquiry for 4 weeks.
Cue the sinking of your heart.
Testing website forms is another great value add service to provide clients.
How do you carry out this service?
Manually?
Or using something like Forms that you get in a Glow account?
However you do it, make the process nice and clear so that your team can follow it easily.
Conclusion
So there you have it, 10 business process examples for your WordPress business.
I hope that from this list alone you can see how someone new to your company would massively benefit from these being created.
They don’t need to ask you.
Researching somewhere online won’t be necessary.
They just read the process.
Processes will dramatically improve the efficiency of your WordPress business.
Regular tasks will be completed quicker.
You’ll onboard team members faster.
Mistakes will be reduced.
You can also use software like Notion or systemHUB to help.
If you aren’t creating processes yet, I’d highly recommend you start doing so – trust me, your business will thank you for it.
Do you use processes in your WordPress business? I’d love to hear which ones you have in place in the comments below.