webfaCeMEdia webfaCeMEdia Prepared forGem Webb & Bob Campbell Book the walkthroughBook →
Gem Webb Internet Marketing & Web Design · Owen SoundSeptember 2026

Seventy client sites, without the WordPress upkeep.

Bob asked the right question: does this make the team's life easier without lowering the quality of what you deliver? This page answers it with the product itself: your redesign, the stack under it, live client sites, the workflow, and straight answers on email, spam and client login.

gemwebb.com today
gemwebb.com today · WordPress + Beaver Builder on WP Engine
Gem Webb homepage redesign preview
Your redesign preview · your logo, your colours, your services and your reviews
Open your redesign → Scroll the whole page, and open it on your phone too.
The situation

Most of the hosting hours go to keeping WordPress running.

70client sites on WP Engine
4of them using most of the plan's resources
10–15hours per hosted site per year (your FAQ)
700–1,050hours a year across 70 sites

Your hosting FAQ is candid about the work behind the $600 + HST a year: speed plugins, plugin and core updates, WooCommerce and gateway updates, uptime checks, Search Console, staging, 30 days of backups. That work matters to your clients, and it is also 700 to 1,050 hours a year that nobody bills at $120–150 an hour.

On the stack below, a large share of those tasks doesn't exist: no plugins, no PHP, no database server per site, nothing to patch on a public admin login. The hours come back to the team for work clients pay for.

Source: gemwebb.com/faqs and /owen-sound-website-hosting. Hours are your published per-site figure multiplied by 70; the share each task takes is your call, not ours.

The stack, end to end

One template, one content editor, and shared services every site plugs into.

Each client site is a WebFacePress site: a fast, pre-built Next.js front end on a global edge network, with content in a separate content dataset for each client. Everything else (email, analytics, bookings, chat, reports) is a shared service the site connects to, so you don't rebuild it 70 times.

WebFacePress

The site template: 35 section types, built-in SEO (sitemap, structured data, share images), responsive images from a CDN.

Visual editor

Clients click into the live page and edit it, with every change versioned and restorable.

Planner and Lab

The planner reads a business's current site and builds the new one; then it designs redesign previews with the business's logo and colours, like yours.

Insights

Privacy-friendly analytics on every site, a Monday email to the owner, an SMS when a real lead comes in.

Connector and Desk

Your team edits pages, schedules posts and sends campaigns by describing the change. Every change is shown before it goes out.

webfaCe Inbox

A Gmail panel that shows the sender's site, bookings, CRM record and chat history. More below.

For Bob · the codebase, measured

What's under the hood, counted by a code graph.

Every repo is indexed into a code graph (functions, files, and the call and import links between them), refreshed on every commit. These are its counts, not estimates.

ComponentWhat it doesFunctionsFilesGraph edges
WebFacePress templateEvery client site starts here7493774,682
PlannerBuilds, previews and deploys sites1,69868511,217
Agent platformCRM, campaigns, social, SMS1,4013607,994
webfacemedia.comOur site, on the same template8384196,097
Connector (MCP server)How the team and Desk edit sites7031304,129
InsightsAnalytics, lead alerts, reports4451202,339
webface.cloudApp hosting in Toronto (Go)426863,190
webfaCe BookingsShared booking service (Go)270521,250
Assistant, mobile, classes, qualifierChat, iPhone app, timetables, lead scoring4742503,318
12 core repos≈ 7,000≈ 2,480≈ 44,200

Counts from the codebase-memory graph index, September 2026. Desk is left out because its count includes the open-source base it is built on. Bob is welcome to a screen-share walkthrough of any of it.

Examples of work · live today

Client sites on this stack right now.

Open any of them on a phone. Each one runs on the same template your 70 sites would use.

Barclay WholesaleBarclay WholesaleGrey Bruce · store + trade accounts Eli Dehghani InsuranceEli Dehghani InsuranceToronto · quotes, booking, calculator JMportJMport Design HouseDesign studio · with its own assistant Reading Rescue OntarioReading Rescue OntarioNon-profit · lesson library The Hurst MethodThe Hurst MethodFitness · quiz, shop, videos RDH MarinaRDH MarinaDental hygienist · personal site Integrated Building MaintenanceIBM ServicesTrades · vacuum truck services MT MaintenanceMT MaintenanceProperty maintenance
Case · WordPress + WooCommerce, moved

Barclay Wholesale, a Grey Bruce distributor

Barclay ran on WordPress and WooCommerce. We moved the catalogue, the product images and every old shop URL, connected their inventory system and card payments, and went live on 1 September 2026. Old links from Google and from customers' bookmarks still land on the right product.

It's the closest match to your client base: a Grey Bruce business, a full product catalogue, and email going to Grey Bruce inboxes (more on that under deliverability).

  • 927product images moved from WooCommerce
  • 754old /shop/ URLs redirected permanently (301)
  • 1inventory system connected, so stock and trade orders come from the source
  • 0plugins to update
Demos you can open

Your redesign preview: the Gem Webb homepage, redesigned.

master-demo.webfacemedia.dev: the base template with every section type.

bilingual-demo.webfacemedia.dev: English and French with a store.

The planner building a site
The planner reads a business's current site and builds the new one. Then it designs a redesign preview with your logo and colours, like yours.
The workflow

What changes for the team, and what changes for your clients.

Your retainer model stays as it is: clients email a request, the team does it within 72 hours, time is logged in 15-minute units. What changes is what each request takes, and what no longer needs doing at all.

TaskToday on WordPressOn WebFacePress
Plugin, core, PHP updatesEvery site, all yearGoneNo plugins or PHP to update. Your fleet runs on one shared template, so a fix goes out to every site at once.
StagingA staging server per siteBuilt inEvery change gets a preview URL before it goes live.
Backups30 days of full-site backupsBuilt inEvery content edit is versioned and can be restored; the code is in git.
UptimeAlert after 5–15 minutes downA probe checks every site every 15 minutes; pre-built pages on an edge network don't depend on one server staying up.
SpeedSpeed plugins, image optimizersPages are pre-built; images are resized and served from a CDN automatically.
Building pagesBeaver Builder, free-form drag and dropTrade-off35 designed section types, set per brand. Less free-form layout, and nobody can break the design by accident. Custom sections are added in code when a client needs one.
Client self-editsWP admin + a training video per siteClick into the live page at theirdomain/admin and type. Changes show as they are made.
Client emails a changeLog in, find the page, edit, checkDescribe the change to the connector or Desk; it's shown to you before it goes live. Or edit it yourself in the visual editor.
Monthly reportingAssembled by handMonday traffic email, weekly "what customers asked the chat", monthly ads report on the 1st. All sent automatically.
Insights analytics dashboard
Insights: traffic, sources and genuine leads for each client, with a Monday email to the owner.
Agent platform dashboard
Agent platform: CRM, email campaigns and scheduled social posts for each client, nothing sent without approval.
Bob's questions, answered

Email deliverability, spam, client login, and "is this more work?"

For each: what's in place today, what we add when your sites move (we commit to these as part of onboarding), and how Bob can check it himself.

Email deliverability

"all major issues considered such as email deliverability"
Today
  • Form mail goes through a dedicated transactional mail service, branded with each client's name, logo and colour.
  • We found and fixed a DKIM record problem on webfacemedia.com that was getting form mail rejected under DMARC.
  • Grey Bruce specifically: some local ISPs block shared sending IPs. We hit this with Barclay and moved their invoices to a mail service those ISPs accept.
  • Link tracking is off on reports, so links aren't rewritten into anything that looks like phishing.
When your sites move
  • Each client's form mail is sent from the client's domain, authenticated with SPF, DKIM and DMARC, not from a shared address.
  • Clients with Grey Bruce customers get the mail route that gets through locally.
  • Their existing mailbox (Google Workspace, Zoho or Exchange) doesn't move: we only add DNS records.
How Bob checks
  • Send a test from any form; the delivery log shows delivered, deferred or bounced.
  • Paste the headers into any DKIM checker: pass, aligned to the client's domain.
  • DMARC reports go to an address you choose.

Spam on forms

"taking care of spam"
Today
  • A hidden trap field: bots that fill it get a fake "thanks" and nothing is sent.
  • A gibberish filter drops random-string name/business submissions the same way.
  • Rate limits: 5 submissions per IP and 3 per email address in 10 minutes.
  • Every field is checked again on the server (English, French, Spanish).
When your sites move
  • Cloudflare Turnstile on every form: invisible to people, blocks scripted bots, no picture puzzles.
  • Every submission is also stored, so a lead is never only in an email that could be lost.
How Bob checks
  • Post to the form endpoint from a script: rejected.
  • Submit 6 times in a minute: the 6th gets "too many".
  • Open the stored submissions for any client.

Validation and verification for client login

"validation and verification for client login"
Today
  • Two sign-ins, each on an established provider, not a home-made login: the site editor (Google, GitHub or email accounts) and the client dashboards (Clerk).
  • Access is given per person by email address, with roles; removing someone takes effect at once.
  • No wp-login.php or xmlrpc.php for bots to hammer: sign-in happens at the account provider, not on a form the site hosts.
When your sites move
  • Verified email required on every account; two-step verification required for anyone who can publish.
  • Roles set per client: owners publish, staff draft, your team administers.
  • A written access list per client, reviewed when staff change.
How Bob checks
  • Invite a test address: it can't do anything until the email is verified.
  • Try to publish without two-step set up: blocked.
  • Try /wp-admin, /wp-login.php, /xmlrpc.php on any site: nothing there.

"It sounds like another thing I need to do"

"If you can prove to me it makes my life easier without degrading the quality of product we offer, I'd of course be open to it."
What goes away
  • Plugin, core, PHP and WooCommerce update cycles.
  • Staging servers, backup restores, speed plugins.
  • Hacked-site cleanups and wp-login brute force.
  • The 4 sites fighting 66 others for one plan's resources.
What's new to learn
  • Building with sections instead of Beaver Builder. Plan on a learning curve here; we pair with Bob on the first sites.
  • Git for code changes (the planner and connector handle most content work without it).
  • DNS changes per client at switch-over (a runbook we write with you).
Quality
  • Built-in SEO on every page: sitemap, structured data, share images, clean URLs, redirects kept.
  • Pages are pre-built, so speed doesn't depend on a plugin stack.
  • Judge it on your redesign and the 8 sites above.
webfaCe Inbox · Gmail

Your retainer runs on email. The client's details sit beside it.

Your update packages start with a client email. webfaCe Inbox adds a panel to Gmail: open a client's email and it shows their site's status and latest preview, their CRM record, their bookings, and what they asked the site chat before writing. It drafts the reply in your voice. You read it and press Send yourself.

webfaCe Inbox panel beside an email in Gmail
In Gmail on the web: the panel sits to the right of the open email.
webfaCe Inbox panel close-up
The panel: CRM record, client site, reply draft.
  • Reads only the email you open. It can't search or list the mailbox.
  • Drafts appear only when you tap; it never sends.
  • Works in Gmail on the web and in the Gmail phone app.
  • For prospects: start a redesign preview for their business from the panel.

Running on our team's Gmail today. The public Google Workspace listing is in Google's review; we can show it live on a call now.

Integrations · MCP

Run all 70 clients from the tools the team already uses.

The whole platform is exposed through one MCP server (Model Context Protocol, the open standard Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor and VS Code speak): 80 tools covering sites, pages, content, CRM, campaigns, social, ads, analytics and bookings. Your team signs in once, picks the Gem Webb organization, and asks in plain language: "How did Highland Marine's site do last week?", "Draft next month's posts for Graham Construction", "Which forms came in overnight?" Each client's data stays separate, and anything that publishes is shown for approval first.

Claude

Add webfaCeMEdia as a custom connector. Ask about any client's traffic, leads and ads, edit pages, approve drafts. Live now.

ChatGPT

The same tools inside ChatGPT: manage clients, approve drafts, publish posts. Listing in OpenAI's review; waitlist open.

Make

Call the platform from any Make scenario, so your existing automations can create contacts, publish posts or pull reports.

Cursor, VS Code, any MCP tool

One endpoint, mcp.webfacemedia.com/mcp, with OAuth sign-in. Bob can drive client sites from his editor.

Gmail

webfaCe Inbox puts each client's site, CRM record, bookings and chat history beside their email.

Google Calendar

webfaCe Bookings takes bookings on the client's site straight into their Google Calendar, with no double-booking.

Meta and Google Ads

Ad accounts connect under one manager. Campaigns go out only after approval; results and a monthly report sit next to the site's numbers. It fits the work Justin does today.

Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn

A social calendar per client: plan, approve, publish, and see results beside the website traffic.

Email campaigns

Newsletters and sequences built in, sent from the client's name. The work Mailchimp does for your clients today, without a separate account per client.

The webfaCeMEdia iPhone app
The iPhone app (App Store): each client checks their site, leads and numbers, and gets a push when something needs them. Your team sees every client from one login.

What it means for the retainer

  • A client emails "update our hours". Someone on the team asks the connector, reviews the change, approves. Logged, done.
  • Monthly reporting assembles itself: traffic, leads, chat questions and ads in one place per client.
  • Gem's ads and social services run on the same platform as the websites, so results show up together for the client.

Sign-in is per person with the email on the account; each person sees only the organizations they belong to.

Moving from WordPress

What moves automatically, what gets rebuilt, and what can stay put.

Moves automatically

  • Blog posts and categories, with their text formatting.
  • Featured images and media.
  • Every old URL, as a permanent redirect, so rankings and inbound links carry over.
  • Page text, which the planner uses to rebuild each page.

Our importer reads each site through the WordPress REST API (/wp-json). Sites with it switched off need it turned on for the import.

Gets rebuilt, not converted

  • Beaver Builder layouts. They are rebuilt as WebFacePress sections. We don't pretend a converter exists.
  • Plugin features (forms, sliders, galleries) map to built-in sections.
  • SEO titles and descriptions from Yoast or similar are carried over by hand per site.

Can stay on WordPress

Sites that don't need to move can stay where they are and still get Insights, chat, reports and Inbox. Desk can edit a live WordPress site through its API, with every change shown for approval before it publishes.

Four ways to start

Pick the one that fits. They combine.

None of these asks anyone to take a pay cut. The hours that go to WordPress upkeep today move to work that's billable, at your rates.

ARecommended first step

Pilot the 4 heavy sites

Scope
Move the 4 sites using most of the WP Engine plan. The other 66 stay where they are.
Bob's role
Works alongside us on the rebuilds and learns the section system on live client work.
Clients see
A faster site at the same address, and the visual editor.
Risk
Low: 4 sites, old URLs redirected, WordPress copies kept until everyone signs off.
What you learn
Measured hours saved and client reaction, before deciding on the other 66.
B

Stay on WordPress, add our tools

Scope
No migration. Add Insights, site chat, stored form leads, weekly reports and webfaCe Inbox to existing sites.
Bob's role
Unchanged, with Desk able to make WordPress edits through the site's API, each one approved first.
Clients see
A Monday traffic email and chat on their site.
Risk
Lowest. Upkeep hours stay as they are.
C

White-label partnership

Scope
Gem Webb sells, designs and supports; webfaCeMEdia runs the platform underneath. Your brand on the sites and emails, not ours.
Bob's role
Lead developer on the new stack: designs, builds sections, owns quality. More building, less patching.
Clients see
Gem Webb, as today. Same invoices, same contact.
Commercials
Agency pricing per site, set on a call. Your client pricing stays yours to set.
D

Full-fleet migration in waves

Scope
All 70 sites, in waves grouped by type (law firms, trades, accommodation, stores), after the pilot.
Bob's role
Leads each wave; we handle imports, redirects, DNS and email records.
Clients see
A scheduled switch-over date, a new editor, the same address.
End state
WP Engine plan retired.

Published reference prices (webfacemedia.com): builds from C$1,997 / C$3,497 / C$4,997 one-time; managed hosting US$50 or US$100 a month per site; webfaCe Desk from C$249 a month. Agency and fleet pricing is set per partner on a call.

What we commit to at onboarding

Written down so Bob can hold us to it

Next step

A 30-minute screen-share with Gem and Bob.

We walk through your redesign, make a change live in a client site's editor, send a test form through the spam checks and read the headers, then pick the 4 pilot sites together and walk one through the import. Bob drives wherever he wants to.

Book the walkthrough → Open your redesign
Tommy Adeniyi647.286.5045tommy@webfacemedia.com