WordPress Maintenance: Managing Multiple Sites
So the interesting thing about WordPress sites is that, if you are not careful, all of the sudden you end up with a bunch of them and you end-up spending a lot of time maintaining plug-in, theme and system updates..
Yes, you can always turn updates off, but security-wise that may not be best practice.. Keeping up with multiple WordPress sites can be time-consuming.
What do I need to Manage?
If you have multiple Word Press sites, at bare minimum, you need to:
- Update core WordPress files
- Update the multiple plugins you have on each site
- Potentially update the Theme on your site.
- Execute backups (not only to the code, but also the content which is in a database)
- Have the ability to quickly access any of your sites
Additionally would be nice to:
- Manage comments from a single point
- Post / Schedule posts to multiple sites
- Manage your ads / banners / promotions across multiple sites
So are there any tools that allows me to manage updates, backups and other admin functions on multiple sites ? The answer is OF COURSE, but they vary widely in features and price… Let ‘s look at a few I have used..
InfiniteWP |
 |
I have personally been using InfiniteWP to manage my sites and simple needs. It is a great and stable product for the basic functions.
It supports unlimited sites for FREE for the basic functions. There are lots of paid (and very useful) “extensions” you can purchase.
unlike ManageWP, you need to install the application on a server of your own. Once installed and working (a very simple process, but requires a bit of know-how) then you connect via a plugin that needs to be installed on each of your target sites. From there
One thing I liked, is the fact that it keep a log of all of the changes made centrally, which you can refer to..
ManageWP |
 |
ManageWP is considered the golden standard out there.
It is sold as a service for WordPress that allows website owners to manage all of their sites from one convenient administration panel. From there an end-user can perform many of the tedious WordPress tasks such as updating plugins. Some of the tasks that ManageWP helps automate include:
- Automatically update all of your plugins, including WPtouch Pro, with one click
- Email notification for when updates are available
- Automatic monitoring of your sites to make sure they are online
- Ability to clone a website and deploy a copy in another location
- Automated backups to make sure you never lose data
- Ability to post to any of your managed sites from one location
iControlWP |
 |
I tried the 30-day free trial and used it for a bit… I did not find it as user friendly as the other ones mentioned above, but it delivered everything as advertised!
A very quick comparison table follows:
| Feature |
InfiniteWP |
ManageWP |
iControlWP |
| Price Per Site Per Month (estimated) |
N/A |
$1.60 |
$0.60 |
| Core Upgrade (Selective or All) |
Free |
$ |
$ |
| One-click login to any site |
Free |
$ |
$ |
| Install, manage plugins & themes |
Free |
$ |
$ |
| Manual backups |
Free |
$ |
$ |
| Restore / Dowload Backups |
Free |
$ |
$ |
| Create off-site backups |
$ |
$ |
$ |
| Schedule Backup |
$ |
$ |
$ |
| Manage posts and comments on Multiple site |
$ |
$ |
$ |
| Bulk create Posts, Pages, and Links |
$ |
$ |
$ |
| Manage Users |
$ |
$ |
N/A |
Other tools I’ve seen or heard of, but have not used these, include:
- CMS Commander
- WP Remote
- xMarkPro (need to check this one, looks good!)
- wpPipeline
| Side Note:Regarding: “Manage your ads / banners / promotions across multiple sites “ — I have not found any tools out there to do this effectively and efficiently… If you know of one drop a comment or email! |
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