What to do when your web designer disappears

This happens more than you would think

A few times a month we get a message that starts the same way: “Our web guy stopped replying.” Sometimes he moved on, sometimes the agency closed, sometimes there was a falling out. The site is still up, or half up, and nobody in the business knows the passwords, where the domain lives, or whether the hosting bill is being paid.

It is fixable. The order matters.

Step 1: find out what you own

A business website is four separate things, often at four separate providers, and each can be in someone else’s name.

The domain. Your address, yourbusiness.ca. Registered with a registrar (GoDaddy, Namecheap, Cloudflare, a Canadian registrar). Look it up on a WHOIS service: it will show the registrar, the expiry date and, sometimes, the registrant. If the registrant is your old designer, this is your priority.

The hosting. The server the site lives on. The WHOIS name servers usually reveal the host. Old invoices will too.

The website login. The WordPress, Shopify or other admin account. Try yourbusiness.ca/wp-admin or the Shopify login with any email you might have used.

Email. If your email runs on the same hosting, losing the host means losing email. Check where your mail is actually delivered before touching anything.

Write all four down with what you know and what you do not.

Step 2: get access back

For each provider, use the account recovery process with proof of business ownership: business registration, invoices, the email address on the account. Registrars and hosts deal with this daily and have a procedure. Be polite, be persistent, and keep everything in writing.

For the domain specifically, if it is in the designer’s name, email them asking for a transfer to a registrar account in your business name. Most people do this without fuss once asked clearly. If there is no reply, the registrar’s ownership dispute process exists for this case, and the paper trail you collected in step 1 is what wins it. Do not let the domain expire while this plays out; if the renewal is due, pay it through whatever channel you can.

Step 3: back up before anything else

Once you have admin access, take a full backup (files and database) and store it somewhere you control. Only then change passwords, remove the old designer’s admin accounts and update the recovery email on every provider. Changing things before backing up is how a bad week becomes a bad month.

Step 4: assess honestly

With access and a backup, look at the site the way a mechanic looks at a car.

Is the platform current? WordPress two years behind on updates is a security problem. A page builder that was discontinued is a rebuild. Is the site secure? Unexplained admin users, strange files, a warning in Google Search Console, pharmacy spam in search results: these mean it has been compromised. Is it working? Forms that never arrived anywhere, broken booking, dead links. Is it fast? Run it through PageSpeed Insights on mobile. Is it ranking? Check Search Console for clicks over the last three months.

Step 5: rescue or rebuild

Rescue when the platform is current, the build is reasonable and the problems are a dated look, a few broken things and missing maintenance. A refresh of the design, repairs and a security patch bring it back for a fraction of a rebuild. That is our Revamp & Rescue service, from $1,490.

Rebuild when the platform is obsolete or abandoned, the site has been hacked more than once, it scores below 40 on mobile, or it was built on a closed platform you cannot take with you. Patching those costs more than replacing them, and you end up with the same problems in a year. Our pricing guide covers what a rebuild costs in Calgary.

Either way, the redirect and content rules in our redesign guide apply, so the rankings you have survive.

Step 6: make sure it cannot happen again

Whoever you work with next, put these in the agreement. The domain, hosting and every login are in accounts owned by the business, with the business’s email as the recovery address. You receive a copy of the site files and database at launch and on request. There is a written care plan that says what is maintained, how often, and what happens if either side ends the relationship.

That is how we work with every client, and it is written into our proposals. Our Care Plan covers hosting, updates, backups and security for $129 a month, and if you ever leave, you take everything with you.

If you are in the middle of this right now

Send us the URL. We will tell you where the domain and hosting are, what state the site is in, and whether it is a rescue or a rebuild. No charge for the look, and no pressure either way.