Category: WordPress

Don’t forget, WordPress is a CMS.

It strikes us as somewhat ironic that many business owners who own WordPress websites seem to forget that WordPress is a content management system. Put differently, a lot of WordPress website owners seem to forget what it means that their site is built on a CMS.

They think that if they change their service offerings, they need a new site.

They think if they get a new logo, they need an entirely new site.

They think that if the site starts to look old and outdated, it needs to be rebuilt “from the ground up.”

Which ground isn’t entirely clear.

But, because these “projects” seem big and complicated, the “project” is put off for months or years because it seems so daunting. It’s classic analysis paralysis. From Wikipedia:

A decision can be treated as over-complicated, with too many detailed options, so that a choice is never made, rather than try something and change if a major problem arises.

The proof is everywhere: just look at all the old, dusty WordPress sites out there. Why would someone let their website get so outdated? Maybe it’s partially because they think their site is hard-coded and stored in a vault somewhere. While the DIY’ers of the world are familiar with the WordPress community’s superabundance of plugins and themes, site-owners don’t often take advantage of WordPress’s enormous potential. And we believe the reason for this, more often than not, is the fear of finding, committing to, and paying a new contractor to tackle the “project.”

We believe these site owners shouldn’t have to find a contractor at all; instead, what they need is an easy-to-use service that will help them take advantage of the site they already have. They need a way to request a task and quickly see the results. They need a system that, with few taps, lets them try on a new theme, or have their plugins updated. They need to easily preview changes without going live.

At HubRunner, we’re building a product that does all of the above. They keys are ease-of-use, instant service, and low prices.

If you’ve got an old clunker in the cloud, get the HubRunner app. Your site may be a classic sports car under the rust, and restoring it will cost a lot less than you might think.

We decided this post needed an impressive title, so we settled on ^^^ that. But really, we’re just talking about finding the right contractor.

THE PROBLEM

Finding someone to work on your website sucks.

Anyone who’s used a freelancer marketplace knows how painful the process can be. Anyone who’s ever sent out an RFP for a website project really knows it.

Even with the best available tools like UpWork, it’s still a tedious and time consuming process.

Beyond all the pitfalls of searching for the right person, once you’ve made your choice you may find your contractor doesn’t communicate well, or can’t do what they said they could. They might be delays if they spend more time on another project that’s paying them more. You might end up spending more than you expected. You might not get the project completed, and instead have to go find another contractor.

The old world of website service is insanely inefficient, where service providers prey on people’s lack of technical and practical knowledge about websites. (Frankly, this is true for most tech and IT-related services – but for now, we’re focused on websites).

The end-user experience of getting a website – or getting something done to an existing website – is absolutely abysmal. From buying a domain to launching a site, we’d be hard pressed to figure out how the experience could possibly be any worse.

This is why we all love referrals. We love them because another person, someone we know and trust, has gone through the painful and often expensive process of finding and vetting a given contractor. The contractor comes to us already-tested, both as a professional and as a human being. The contractor still might not be the perfect person for the job, but at least there’s an element of trust and a track record of positive results.

As our team began to face the many challenges of creating a two-way marketplace for WordPress service, we knew that the agent vetting process needed to be done on our end. Website owners shouldn’t vet their own service providers, for many reasons (lack of technical knowledge, lack of time, lack of negotiating skills, etc.).

Instead, our software completely eliminates the need to look for a contractor.

DYNAMIC SKILL MATCHING

Agents on HubRunner are WordPress professionals with only the best work experience and service quality. We constantly improve the experience of using HubRunner by tracking their work and the ratings that you, the users, give them.

But our software goes one step beyond this.

We not only vet agents on their work history, we vet them on very specific types of work, on granular capabilities. Then, we work hard to ensure that agents only see requests that fit their HubRunner capabilities profile. This means that an SEO-related request will only be offered to agents with an expert knowledge of SEO. A request about slow page-load times can only be claimed by an agent with expertise in that area.

It’s kind of like online dating, but without the smiling vacation photos – and without the dates.

Passwords are a necessary … hassle … when it comes to managing a website. Your site has to be secure, but it’s a pain to store, use and share passwords. Sure, there are some great systems (like LastPass) that help, but we’re dealing with lots of passwords, and we really prefer not to see anyone else’s credentials.

THE OLD DAYS

When providing website service, obtaining a customer’s website login credentials is the first task. In the old days (i.e., through 2015), it served as a token of trust in a business relationship. But it involved a lot of unpleasantness:

– Creating (and paying good money for) password management accounts for lots of users
– Training users on how to manage passwords (rules, organization, etc.)
– Managing administrative access to the password retrieval inbox
– Notifying users if login credentials were updated.
– And on, and on, etc.

Oftentimes, finding and using login credentials took more time than actually providing the service that had been requested. And on top of all that, it meant that anyone who provided service could retain the credentials forever, and could access the site as long as the user account wasn’t deleted from the site backend.

Exhausting, right? We called it password mania.

A BETTER WAY

When it came to developing our own software for an on-demand WordPress support network, we knew we needed an elegant solution to the password mania problem.

After months of development, our software was really coming together, feeling cohesive and efficient. We knew that sending login credentials to a third party really should be a thing of the past. We believed the solution was a time-based website access system which would:

1. Enable a pre-approved WordPress agent to access a website when they claim a service request
2. Function without the agent ever seeing or entering the login credentials
3. Revoke website access immediately upon completion of a service request

Temporary site access for WordPress is just one of the features that makes HubRunner what it is – but in a sense, it’s the glue. HubRunner grants website access to an agent only for the duration of the work they are handling on that site. As soon as the user indicates the agent has completed a request to their satisfaction, the agent’s site access is revoked.

All of this happens without the agent ever seeing or entering your credentials. Beyond simply enhancing the smooth experience of using HubRunner for WordPress service, this feature increases security, creates a seamless way for agents to deliver service, and reduces the total time for each service request.

To learn more about how HubRunner matches customers to agents, read our post “Dynamic Skill Matching for WordPress Service.”