Don't Hurt Your Online Business - The Benefits of Having a Test Site

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Don't Hurt Your Online Business - The Benefits of Having a Test Site

Too many times I've seen people in live chat or a blog post on the WA dashboard feed detailing the horrible issues they've had with their sites and the steps they had to take to get it all fixed just because they moved to a new theme or installed plugin X. Many of these issues could have been avoided altogether simply by utilizing a test site.

As a free Starter member, you are given 2 sites. Assuming you're only using 1 as you progress through the training, that leaves another untapped resource you can use for staging and testing ideas, themes and plugins without risking your production site. Now move on up to a Premium membership and you have 25 free sites available to you.

I highly recommend you take advantage of this free tool set and setup a dummy or test site to try things out on before moving them to your production site. You'll be able to eliminate problems before they arise.

Take one of your free website spots and create a test site. Go to Websites > Site Builder and build that test site using the "On a Free Domain" option. Just give it some name no one would care about (mine is 2017) and keep it on-hand for when you need it.

I recommend you set it up with the same themes and plugins you're using on your live sites so it acts as a template for you to test on before making changes to your production site. If you do have multiple sites, you can still install everything you have on them into this one site and simply activate/deactivate the various themes and plugins to make your test site a mirror of the site you want to work on at any particular time.

By approaching it in this way, when you change the theme or add a plugin, you'll get more realistic results (suppose one plugin conflicts with another, you wouldn't see that if you didn't have the other plugin installed, etc.). Be sure to toss up a couple of pages and posts too. They can simply say "blah, blah, blah" or "yadda, yadda, yadda", but you should have them to make sure your changes don't affect them in some unexpected way.

Now, when you want to try out that hot new theme or add that cool feature some new plugin offers, you can test it out first. This will allow you to not only make sure it's compatible with everything else on your site but also figure it all out and know how to get it just the way you want it so you can set it up properly and, more importantly, quickly on your production site. That will offer a much better experience for your visitors vs having it partially configured while you're figuring it out, leaving your site looking strange until it's finished.

It may take a little more time to do something twice, but it's a lot less vs having to troubleshoot an issue or rebuild lost data. Consider it a safety net for your business.

Another Use for a Test Site

On a side note, another great benefit to doing something like this is to use it to help others. Many times, I'm in live chat helping someone out and I turn to my test site and install whatever it is they are having issues with, usually a theme or plugin. By doing so I'm able to see what they see and can walk them through the issue, assuming I can find a fix.


Conclusion

There you have it, a relatively quick and easy tool at your disposal. If used correctly, it can save you a lot of time and effort down the road.

Although it's not rocket science, I hope this little tip helps someone out. I find it invaluable, especially when helping others with their issues.

Do you know of other advantages a test site offers? Did I miss something in my recommendation here? Do you have examples of how a test site helped or would have helped you? Please share in the comments below.

Thank you,

Scott

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Recent Comments

61

You are so, so right. It is a very good idea to have a test site. I have thought about setting one up and haven't done so. I can see it as especially useful when you are trying to learn the "customize" function of your site. If you can learn it on a test site, you don't have the nail-biting tension of wondering whether it will work.

Absolutely and, with all the sites we're given with our membership, it's not a burden.

New to WA and very happy I found this. Thank you so much for providing this information for us!

Any time

Great advice, Scott, thanks for sharing.

Bushra

This is a fantastic tip! I'll be sure to keep that in mind with my website!

I think you'll find it saves you a lot of headache.

Maybe I can use my horror site as my test site.

If you're sure you're not going to pursue that one, yes...use it as a test bed.

I'll be more confident using health and fitness niche. It's broad now, but it's a good place to start. I did mentioned I wanted to work in the fitness industry at some point.

I would jusy follow what is instructed. If I added plugins and other codes which are not included In which I'm not well versed with I might be adding problem to myself.

Yep..that's the beauty of a test site...all the bells and whistles with out the worry of what it will do to your production site if you screw it up.

Love this advice. Heading off to do it now.

I have a training from Smarketeer on how to install WordPress on your computer but can't get it to install.

Sonny

I'm glad you like it.

Great advice, Scott. Our test site has already saved us from some headaches.
Colette and Philip

I have a ‘test’ site. It has saved me a couple of times. Great advice!

Thank you for sharing....I set up a test site but I'm not using it...and consequences abound ....my OceanWP is knocking me down....Bad request...error on programmig....I'm a sad newbie...

That's the trick...just having one won't do you any good. You have to use it ;).

I so wish I had heeded this advice weeks ago. I changed Themes, and have been trying to reconstruct the site since...sigh.
And yes, I do have a 'Sandbox' site...I just didn't think os using it... a mistake I will not make again.
Shaunna

Don't feel too bad. I have it and there are times I don't use it either. It hasn't bitten me in the butt yet but...

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