What website maintenance costs in Jordan

Short answer: the minimum to keep a business website online in Jordan is the domain and the hosting, usually 40 to 150 JOD a year together. The SSL certificate is free in most cases. Updates, backups, monitoring and edits are the part you choose to pay for. Some Jordanian providers publish basic maintenance from about 25 JOD a month, and Saree3 care plans start at 80 JOD a month. Whether you need a plan at all depends on what your site runs on and how often it changes.

Yearly costs at a glance

Ask for every yearly cost in writing before a site is built, so the first renewal is not a surprise. The cost of the build itself is covered in how much a website costs in Jordan.

Hosting, domain and SSL

These three keep the site reachable. They renew every year whether anyone touches the site or not.

• Domain: register it in your name, with an email you control. If a provider holds it in their name, moving later turns into a negotiation.
• Hosting: shared hosting suits most company websites. Online stores and web systems usually need cloud hosting billed monthly. Some fast, simple sites run on platforms with free plans.
• SSL: the padlock and the https in the address bar. It is free in most cases and should renew on its own. If someone charges you every year for a basic certificate, ask why.

Set renewals to automatic on a card you check. An expired domain takes the site and your email down on the same day.

Updates, backups and security

This is what a maintenance plan mostly pays for, and how much you need depends on the platform.

• WordPress and WooCommerce need regular updates to WordPress itself, the theme and every plugin. Outdated plugins and themes are a common way into WordPress sites, so this is not optional.
• Shopify, Wix and other hosted platforms run the servers and the security of the platform for you, and you pay for that in the subscription. Your part is apps, settings and content.
• Custom-coded sites without plugins need far fewer updates. They still need backups of the content, a check after major browser changes, and someone to call when a form stops sending.

Whatever the platform, a maintenance plan worth paying for includes:

• Backups stored away from the site's own server, and a restore that has been tested at least once.
• Updates applied and checked soon after release, not left for months.
• Uptime monitoring, so the provider hears about a down site before your customers do.
• Form and checkout checks. A broken form loses leads without showing any error on the page.
• A short monthly note of what was done.

Content edits

Most edits are small: a new price, a new photo, a staff change, a holiday notice. Every site Saree3 builds comes with a dashboard, so your team can make these without a developer. A plan then covers the edits you would rather hand over, plus new pages or sections.

If you change content every week, a plan that includes edits usually costs less than paying per request. If you change it twice a year, it usually does not.

Saree3 care plans

Depending on the plan, care can include backups, system and library updates, fixing issues, performance monitoring, content edits, new pages or sections, a periodic technical review and regular reports. The proposal lists exactly what your plan covers for your site. Larger projects get a custom plan. We also maintain sites and apps we did not build, after a short technical review. See maintenance and support.

Plan or pay per fix

A monthly plan makes sense if

• The site runs on WordPress or WooCommerce, with plugins to keep updated.
• It is an online store or takes bookings, so an hour of downtime loses orders.
• You change content often and nobody in house has time to do it.
• The site connects to other systems, such as a payment gateway, a CRM or JoFotara, which can change on their side.

Paying per fix makes sense if

• The site is a small company site that changes a few times a year.
• It is custom-coded or static, with little to update.
• Someone on your team can make content edits from the dashboard.

Even then, keep three things in place: the domain and hosting renewing automatically, a recent backup that you hold yourself, and the name of someone who will answer when the site goes down.

Questions to ask before you sign a plan

1. What exactly is included each month, and what is billed extra?
2. How often are backups taken, where are they stored, and how fast can you restore one?
3. What is the response time for a down site, and for a normal edit request?
4. How many content edits or hours are included, and do unused ones carry over?
5. Who holds the logins to the domain, the hosting and the site, and will I keep them if I cancel?
6. What notice do I give to cancel, and what do I receive when I leave?

A provider that answers these clearly in writing is usually one you can work with for years. One that cannot answer them will be hard to hold to anything later.

A yearly example

For a five to ten page company website, the yearly running cost looks like this:

Business email and paid plugins come on top if you use them. Ask for the plan price for your own site, since it depends on the platform and how much changes. The website cost calculator gives a starting price for a new build in a few clicks, and the pricing page lists every starting price.