Managed Website Hosting
You Can Rely On

For many years, Sland self-managed hosting directly for our clients so we could keep our hands on the dials and fine-tune performance and reliability as closely as possible, and that approach served our clients well.

As our client base and technical requirements grew, it became clear that self-managing server infrastructure wasn't a scalable or responsible long-term model. Website hosting is a specialized discipline, and rather than pretend otherwise, we chose to partner with a team that focuses exclusively on this work.

Throughout 2026, for all current interested clients, we're transitioning fully to this managed hosting approach so we can continue delivering the same level of performance and reliability, while focusing our expertise where it matters most: building, integrating, and supporting WordPress websites.

Hosting is intentionally scoped to infrastructure and baseline website upkeep. The following are not included:

• Content updates, page edits, or publishing support
• Control Panels (cPanel, PLESK, etc.)
• Cloudflare and Cookie Consent are not included by default, but highly recommended
• Nameserver, DNS Zone File, or Email management
• Design changes, layout refinements, or UX improvements
• New features, functionality, or custom integrations
• SEO strategy, audits, optimization, or reporting
• Accessibility audits or remediation work
• Analytics setup, tracking configuration, or reporting
• Training, documentation, or "how should we…" guidance
• Third-party licenses, subscriptions, or software costs
• Emergency or after-hours work outside maintaining website uptime per SLA

This separation keeps hosting predictable and ensures additional work is properly scoped, prioritized, and supported.

Cause: Site is receiving more traffic than it can sustain and your website slows down, displays a white page, or even error message. Server restart and upgrade may be required.

Result: Future hosting invoices prorated to new cost + billable time to make the upgrade

Sland to deploy a staging environment to restore backup. Review, QA, and potentially make updates or go live as required.

Sland will review website code, plugins, and third-party connections to attempt to quarantine / remove malicious code and/or restore from a stable backup.

Symptoms: Site is loading a white page, website is showing injected content (strange ads, pages redirecting, or displaying third-party content, etc.)

Normal Causes: Out of date plugins, vulnerable third party integrations, custom code, weak passwords, sharing passwords, not updating passwords, sending credentials via insecure means like email, etc.

Cause: Software your website relies on requires an upgraded version of server software to run securely. Eg. Wordpress, plugins, third-party integrated software says it needs a higher version of PHP to run, etc. We would backup, upgrade, test, and launch your upgraded website.

Managed cloud hosting provides dedicated resources, proactive monitoring, security patching, backups, and uptime accountability, designed for business-critical websites, not personal or hobby sites. These costs are industry standard for Managed Hosting.

We're making this change not because anything was broken, but because hosting has become a specialized discipline of its own.

As our client base and technical requirements have grown, it made more sense to partner with a managed hosting provider whose sole focus is server reliability, security, monitoring, and uptime. By moving to Cloudways on DigitalOcean, your website continues to run fast and stable, with added resilience behind the scenes.

From your perspective, nothing about how you use or manage your website changes — it simply benefits from a more robust, future-proof hosting environment while Sland remains your primary point of contact.

No. Hosting covers infrastructure and baseline maintenance. Ongoing improvements and guidance are handled through hourly support or a retainer.

Backups are provided and managed by Cloudways, and restored by Sland as specifically requested (billable).

As server-side backups are primarily for a 'disaster recovery' type scenario, restoring to a previous backup version within the 14 day window involves manual and billable efforts.

We will track billable time to coordinate on exactly what backup version you want to restore to, deploy a staging environment to test, apply quality assurance, and upon confirmation launch, or alternatively, package a backup for your own deployment purposes.

Should you require a custom backup solution (extended backup retention window, easier access to backups yourself, etc.), we can discuss and make these arrangements.

No. Email falls within the purview of your IT provider, and due to the sensitive and business-critical nature, Sland does not manage email nor DNS settings to configure email.

Yes. Plans are based on real usage. Any recommended changes are discussed in advance and billed via prorated invoice.

No*. Hosting changes do not affect content, design, or URLs.

*With the exception of a one-time free migration for current Sland hosted clients

Due to the variable nature of website traffic and user habits, your web server may need more horsepower to keep up with demands. An underpowered server will appear slow or even display time-out errors which is not ideal for user experience.

After working together to confirm your server needs, you can expect a period of time where we monitor your server specifications closely to adjust as required. Our initial consultation should keep things from changing too drastically. If you require a guaranteed hosting cost, we'd suggest a larger plan to accommodate growth.

Our retainer and ongoing support offerings allot us quarterly check-ins that provide us helpful context on your upcoming events, marketing announcements, and other events that may trigger busy website traffic moments. Retainer clients benefit from monthly maintenance for eCommerce clients. Combined with consideration of your current website server specifications and our Large and Autonomous plans, we can find the right plan for you that has enough horsepower for your needs.

We utilize Cloudways managed cloud hosting platform which is designed for business-critical websites. This means your site runs on dedicated cloud resources (not low-cost shared hosting), with active monitoring, automated alerts, and the ability to scale as traffic and usage change. Combined with our included quarterly hosting updates (or better yet, onboarding to one of our ongoing support retainer plans), we're saving you time, money, and you won't need to learn the ins-and-outs about website hosting when you can't afford downtime.

Web servers and the software that runs on them require periodic updates to maintain security, stability, and performance. Occasionally, a necessary server or platform update can affect how parts of a website function. When this happens, we'll flag it clearly and outline any website work required to ensure everything continues to operate smoothly on the updated environment.

Time spent reviewing, updating, and validating your website in response to these changes is billed as support work, so your site remains secure, compatible, and reliable.

Our Managed Hosting Provider Cloudways will typically be the first to notice any issues with your website, and work to resolve it without prompting. Should the issue require action by Sland to resolve, or more server power to keep up with demand, Sland will be alerted and work to resolve accordingly. Some scenarios are included below:

• Potential upgrade to your hosting package due to high server demand (may result in a prorated website hosting cost increase)
• Cloudways to review server errors, and possible bot attacks (if CloudFlare Enterprise is enabled) (not billable)
• Wordpress core, themes, and plugins reviewed; if an update is required, this is a billable maintenance fix
• Hack - billable
• Client broke it - billable

If you notice an issue with your site performance, please fill out our support request form with details.

• Fill out support request
• Reference our Hosting SLA for turnaround times
• See previous note for steps Sland will take

It is Sland's policy not to be the administrator of your domain nameservers or zone files, but rather utilize delegate access to assist in any configurations that may be necessary.

Option 1 (Cloudflare Enterprise): Assign your A records to Cloudflare, and they'll manage your configurations of Cloudflare Enterprise. You retain full control of your Domain Registrar, Nameservers, and other DNS Zone Files.

Option 2 (Cloudflare Free): Your IT department will need to create a Cloudflare account, and manage configurations accordingly. Any efforts required by Sland to assist in configuration will be billable. Any consultation on initial or ongoing configuration are limited (consider Cloudflare Enterprise for a fully managed solution).