Many of our clients want to edit their website themselves after launch: change a text, add a team member, swap a photo, publish news. We encourage that. It saves time and money, and nobody knows the business better. Clients often ask for a short tutorial or screen recording before handover, and we provide one.
But self-editing also causes a noticeable share of later support requests. Across our maintenance retainers, bug fixes made up 21% of requests and content and design changes 13%. Some of those fixes were needed because an edit had unexpected side effects: a gallery layout broken by images with different proportions, an edit overwritten by an automatic sync, a change in a global template that affected every page.
Here is how to edit safely.
Safe to edit yourself
- Texts on regular pages
- Replacing an image with one of similar proportions
- Adding blog posts or news
- Updating opening hours, phone numbers, prices in text
- Adding a team member using an existing team section
- Publishing or unpublishing pages you created
Edit with care
- Galleries and sliders. Use images with the same aspect ratio as the existing ones, otherwise layouts shift.
- Menus. Adding a page to the menu is fine; restructuring the menu affects every page and mobile navigation.
- Forms. Changing fields can break notifications, CRM integrations or tracking.
- Page layouts. Moving sections around in the page builder can break the mobile view. Check your phone after every change.
Leave to us (or ask first)
- Global templates: header, footer, and templates used on many pages. One change affects the whole site.
- Theme and plugin settings.
- Updates of WordPress, themes and plugins on sites with shops, booking or integrations.
- Anything synchronised from another system. Listings synced from a real estate CRM or a vehicle marketplace will overwrite website edits at the next sync – edit them at the source.
- SEO settings, redirects and tracking codes.
- Legal pages, unless your lawyer provided new texts.
Tips for page builder editing
Most of our sites use Elementor. A few habits prevent most problems:
- Use the responsive preview. After any layout change, switch to the mobile and tablet views.
- Edit, do not rebuild. Change the text in an existing element rather than deleting and adding new ones; styles are preserved.
- Watch for the "global" label. Elements and templates marked as global change everywhere.
- Keep image sizes reasonable. Very large images slow the page. Resize photos before uploading.
- Use revisions. The page builder keeps a history. If something goes wrong, restore the previous version.
- Save as draft when unsure. Preview before publishing.
Image guidelines
| Use | Recommended |
|---|---|
| Hero or banner | Wide landscape image, large enough for desktop but compressed |
| Team photos | Same crop and background for everyone |
| Gallery | Same aspect ratio for all images |
| Blog header | Landscape, consistent size across posts |
| All | Descriptive file name and alt text |
What our tutorials cover
The handover tutorial is a short recording tailored to your site:
- Logging in safely
- Editing texts and images on the main pages
- Adding posts or news
- Using the mobile preview
- Restoring a previous version
- What not to touch, and whom to ask
Roles and user accounts
Give each person who edits the site their own login, with the lowest role that allows them to do their job. An editor who only publishes news does not need administrator rights. Separate accounts make it clear who changed what, and removing access when someone leaves is simple. Never share one admin login across the team or with external freelancers.
Test changes where visitors do not see them
For larger edits – a new page layout or a reworked section – duplicate the page, make your changes on the copy as a draft, and only replace the original once it looks right on desktop and mobile. It takes a minute longer and avoids visitors seeing a half-edited page.
When page builders confuse editors
Page builders are powerful, which also makes them confusing for occasional editors. Clients who edit once every few months often forget where things are. If that is you, a maintenance plan where you send us changes may be simpler than editing yourself – or ask for a refresher.
If something breaks
- Do not panic, and do not keep changing things
- Try restoring the previous revision of the page
- Note what you changed and take a screenshot
- Contact us with the page link
Most accidental edits are fixed in minutes when we know what changed.
FAQ
Can I break my whole website by editing a page?
Editing a regular page affects only that page. Editing global templates, menus or settings can affect everything, which is why we suggest asking first.
Do I need training before editing?
A short tutorial is enough for most clients. We provide one at handover.
Should I update plugins myself?
On simple sites, with a backup first. On sites with shops, booking or integrations, updates should be tested on staging, which is part of our maintenance plans.
Do you keep backups of maintained sites?
Yes. Backups run before updates and on a schedule, stored separately from the hosting account, so a failed update can be rolled back.
How soon will I see a first design?
In our WordPress projects the first draft was ready a median of 8 days after the start, and in landing page projects after 5 days – provided the brief, brand assets and main texts are available.
Where the numbers come from: our own project records in Odoo – 233 finished projects, 909 tasks and about 4941 logged hours, mostly from 2025–2026. Durations are calendar days from kickoff and we quote medians, so one unusually long project does not distort the picture.
Planning a maintenance and hosting project?
If you want a realistic plan for your own project, book a short call with our team and we will walk you through the phases, what we need from you and where projects like yours usually lose time. You can also browse finished work in our maintenance and hosting portfolio.
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