TL;DR:
Ella’s photography website was hacked and deleted overnight. She had no backup and lost years of client work, testimonials, and content. R the Company helped her recover and now manages her backups automatically. Never again, she says.

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Ella stared at her screen, blinking.

It was early on a Monday. She had just sat down with a coffee, opened her browser, and typed in her own URL. A routine she’d done a hundred times.

But this time, her website was gone.

The screen showed:

“404 – Page not found.”

She refreshed. Nothing.

She tried on her phone. Same result.

Then she checked her email. No warning. No error messages. Nothing.

Her heart started racing.

This Wasn’t Just a Website

Ella wasn’t a big agency. She was a self-employed photographer.

She ran family shoots on weekends, school sessions midweek, and a few weddings each season.

Her website was everything.

It had:

• Her galleries

• Her pricing

• Testimonials from happy clients

• Booking details

• SEO-rich blog posts

• Guides for new parents preparing for photo shoots

Losing it wasn’t an inconvenience. It was a disaster.

She Called Her Host

The person on the phone sounded bored.

“Looks like the account was compromised. Someone deleted your files.”

She paused.

“Can you restore a backup?”

“You’re on our basic plan. That doesn’t include backups.”

Ella’s hand clenched the phone tighter.

“So… everything’s gone?”

“Unless you created a backup yourself.”

She hadn’t.

She hung up, staring into space.

The Weeks That Followed Were Awful

Ella tried to rebuild what she could.

She pulled photos from her old hard drives.

Tried writing new copy from memory.

Messaged past clients asking if they still had their review emails.

It was patchwork.

No structure. No design. No confidence.

She was embarrassed to show it to new clients.

And her bookings slowed.

The Moment She Broke

A client messaged her to say they were going with someone else.

They said gently:

“We just weren’t sure if you were still in business. Your site seemed a bit… unfinished.”

Ella nearly cried.

A Friend Sent Her a Link

She was venting in a small business group when a fellow freelancer replied.

“Happened to me too. Never again. I use R the Company now. They do backups automatically.”

Ella clicked the link.

A Message That Actually Cared

The R the Company site said:

“Your website is your work. We protect it like it’s ours.”

She filled in the contact form. They replied in under two hours.

The Plan

R the Company offered:

• Daily backups of all files and databases

• Weekly full-site archives

• Instant restore options

• Pre-update snapshots

• Secure off-site storage

• Monitoring and reporting

It sounded like what she had needed all along.

They Helped Her Rebuild First

They couldn’t recover what was lost, but they helped her rebuild better.

They:

• Recreated her old layout from the Wayback Machine

• Helped reimport old photo albums

• Restyled her galleries

• Optimised the mobile view

• Rewrote the home and services pages with her input

• Cleaned up her contact form

And once it was ready, they set up the backup system.

What She Has Now

• A backup taken every single night

• Another every week, sent to her inbox

• A restore button she can use herself

• Pre-update backups any time she makes changes

• Support on standby if anything ever fails

It Happened Again, But This Time, She Was Ready

Two months later, one of her plugins crashed after an update.

The gallery disappeared.

But this time, she clicked “Restore” from the R the Company dashboard.

Ten minutes later, everything was back.

Ask Yourself

• Do you know if your site is backed up right now?

• Have you tested a restore?

• Could you rebuild if you had to?

• Does your hosting include real recovery support?

If you are unsure, your business is at risk.

You Don’t Need a Backup When Everything Is Working. You Need One When It Isn’t.

Ella thought she didn’t need backups.

She only needed them once. But when that moment came, it was already too late.

Now she says it to everyone she knows.

Don’t Gamble With Your Website

➡️ Protect your site with daily backups from R the Company

Because rebuilding from scratch is not a strategy.