devautomation

Posted on May 20

How to price WordPress maintenance retainers: the 3-tier model that actually works

#freelance #wordpress #business #webdev

Most freelancers underprice WordPress maintenance.

Not slightly -- dramatically. I've seen developers charging 50 PLN/month to manage sites worth tens of thousands to their clients. The problem isn't greed, it's that most of us have no framework for pricing.

Here's the model I use. Three tiers, clear scope, easy to explain to clients.

Why retainers beat hourly for maintenance

Hourly maintenance has a fatal flaw: good maintenance produces no visible work.

When you prevent a hack, fix a plugin conflict before the client notices, or catch a broken form before a customer emails to complain -- the client sees nothing. They're paying for problems that didn't happen.

Retainers solve this. The client pays a fixed monthly fee; you do the work; you send a report showing what you did. Everyone knows what to expect.

Benefits for you:

Predictable revenue
No invoicing anxiety mid-month
Clients stay longer (switching costs are high)
You can schedule the work in batches, not scattered emergency calls

The 3-tier model

Tier 1: Basic -- 149 PLN/month (~35 EUR)

What's included:

Monthly core, plugin, theme updates
Uptime monitoring (15-minute checks)
Monthly backup verification
Monthly security scan
30-minute monthly report email

What's NOT included:

Bug fixes
Content changes
Performance optimization
Priority response

Who it's for: Small business sites that rarely change. Restaurants, local services, portfolios. Clients who want peace of mind but not much more.

Positioning: "We make sure your site doesn't break and someone's watching it."

Tier 2: Standard -- 299 PLN/month (~70 EUR)

What's included:

Everything in Basic
1 hour of minor content changes (text, images, simple page edits)
Performance check and basic optimization quarterly
Plugin conflict monitoring
24-hour response time for issues
Monthly client call (15 min)

Who it's for: Active business sites. Law firms, accountants, tradespeople, coaches -- anyone who gets leads from their site and can't afford downtime.

Positioning: "We handle everything technical so you never have to think about your website."

Tier 3: Premium -- 599 PLN/month (~140 EUR)

What's included:

Everything in Standard
3 hours of changes/month (rollover 1 hour)
Priority response (4-hour response during business hours)
Monthly performance audit
Quarterly SEO check
WooCommerce transaction monitoring (for shops)
Phone support

Who it's for: WooCommerce stores, high-traffic sites, clients who've had bad experiences with downtime or who have complex sites.

Positioning: "Your site is actively managed, not just passively monitored."

The math behind the pricing

Work out your actual time first.

Tier 1: ~1.5 hours/month per client (30 min updates + monitoring check + report)
Tier 2: ~3.5 hours/month per client (updates + monitoring + content + call)
Tier 3: ~6 hours/month per client (everything above + premium response overhead)

At 100 PLN/hour (a conservative rate for WordPress work):

Tier	Hours	Cost to deliver	Price	Margin
Basic	1.5h	150 PLN	149 PLN	~0%
Standard	3.5h	350 PLN	299 PLN	-14%
Premium	6h	600 PLN	599 PLN	~0%

Wait -- those margins are terrible. How does this work?

Automation is the margin.

Without automation:

Updates: 45 min/site manual
Backup check: 20 min/site
Security scan: 30 min/site
Report: 20 min/site
Total: ~2 hours before any content changes

With automation (WP-CLI scripts, automated backup monitoring, scripted reports):

Updates: 5 min/site (automated, review output)
Backup check: 2 min/site (automated alert if fails)
Security scan: 5 min/site (automated, review results)
Report: 5 min/site (generated from script output)
Total: ~20 minutes before content changes

At 10 clients on Tier 1: manual = 20 hours/month, automated = 3.5 hours/month.

That's the difference between making money and working for free.

What to charge for upsells

Maintenance clients are your easiest upsell. They already trust you, they already pay you, they know you know their site.

Standard add-ons:

Speed optimization: 400-800 PLN one-time
SSL setup/migration: 200-400 PLN
New page design: 300-600 PLN/page
WooCommerce setup: 1,500-3,000 PLN
Emergency fix (out of retainer): 150-200 PLN/hour

Never discount the monthly retainer. Discount onboarding fees or first month instead.

How to present the tiers to clients

Don't send a table. Send a short email or a one-page PDF:

"Most clients choose Standard -- it covers updates, monitoring, and the small changes that always come up. Basic is there if you want peace of mind without monthly changes. Premium is for WooCommerce stores or sites where downtime means lost revenue."

Give them a recommendation. People don't want to choose, they want to be guided.

I use a one-page PDF with logo, the three tiers, what's included/excluded, and a signature option at the bottom. It takes 10 minutes to make in Canva, and it closes deals faster than an email thread.

Handling price objections

"That's too expensive."

Ask: "What does your website currently cost you if it goes down for a day?" For an e-commerce site, the answer is usually 10-50x the monthly retainer price. For a lead-gen site, one missed inquiry can be worth hundreds.

"My current person charges less."

"What do they include? We provide [specific list]. If your needs are simpler, Basic might be the right fit -- or we can talk about what you actually need covered."

"I'll just do it myself."

"Completely fine. Here's a checklist of what to do each month." (I actually give them my free maintenance checklist -- it shows the volume of work, and about 30% come back to sign up.)

Getting your first 5 retainer clients

Cold approach:

Local business directories (Google Maps, local chambers of commerce)
Email their contact@domain.com with a short pitch: "I noticed your WordPress site is running [plugin version]. I help local businesses keep their sites secure and running -- can I send you a quick audit?"
Follow up once

Warm approach:

Past one-off clients who paid for a site build but never signed a maintenance contract
Your LinkedIn connections in the SME/local business space

The goal for month one: 3 clients. That's 450-900 PLN/month recurring with minimal ongoing time. By month three, you should have 10+ clients and a system.

The documents you need

To run a clean retainer business:

One-page service agreement (what's included, what's not, payment terms, cancellation)
Monthly report template
Onboarding checklist (site access, backup location, hosting login, DNS access)
Client portal or shared folder for reports

I've put together the agreement template, report template, and onboarding checklist in the agency starter kit:

WordPress Agency Starter Kit -- use DEVTO for discount.

Or grab the free monthly maintenance checklist to see what a month of maintenance actually looks like:

WordPress Monthly Maintenance Checklist -- free download.