After I started to move from other CMS and static websites to WP about three years ago (I did not know Gutenberg was coming then, otherwise I would have looked for another CMS!), three requirements soon became very clear to me in order to convince me to move additional sites to WP:
Finding a great hosting company with a focus on WP.
Having a good off-site backup solution with one-click restore / migrate independent from the hosting.
Selecting a good service for managing my websites (as long as one has to manage two or three websites, no need for that; but with fifteen sites, managing the updates of plugins, etc., from a single point really saves a lot of time).
I was glad to be able to find solutions fulfilling all three requirements: an excellent hosting company with a WP focus (the French WPServeur), a top backup / restore / migrate service (the Indian BlogVault), a reliable management service for my sites (the UK-based iControlWP). This allows to work efficiently and safely (actually, BlogVault and iControlWP tend more and more to answer both backup and management needs, but I do still keep both at this point, although it would be possible to do with one only).
When I think about moving my sites to CP (especially my main sites, with hundreds of pages and posts), I am not only thinking about plugin compatibility, but also about keeping / having access to such services.
I do have in mind points 2 and 3 of my list of requirements. For the time being, I can understand that WP management or backup services are hesitant about including CP, since they do not yet know if there will be a real demand and which kind of additional work it will mean for them, depending upon the way CP will evolve.
I would be interested to know the thoughts of other CP-supporters about that, and also if some WP backup and/or management services have expressed some potential interest in serving the CP community? It may seem early to ask such a question, but I think that it is one that will need to be raised.
Almost all hosting companies will work with WP/CP. The hosting provider does not matter unless it’s a super-cheap neighborhood type of company that has limitations. For backing up sites I used UpdraftPlus and send all back up folders to my Dropbox account. UpdraftPlus works fine with WP as a plugin so it will work fine with CP. If one day this is not the case for some reason, all you have to do is set it to back up to your desktop or email you a back up and go from there. Even if you have a laptop with no space on it, you can always use BackUpBuddy or the much more expensive one WP offers that I can’t recall the name of. Hope that helps. You can also go to a local WP group on meetup and talk to others and hopefully they will know what you’re talking about and be able to offer other suggestions.
I spoke to a potential client yesterday who has a local hosting provider. The potential client told me how his site would go down for several hours at a time, thereby losing thousands in potential purchase orders that could not be placed. His site had zero security, no SSL, but his online business was very profitable. So I suggested he ensure the safety of his business by investing in SSL, professional level hosting, and daily site back ups so he could keep his site in case it is hacked one day. Not sure he understood the concepts I was attempting to address. Probably not or he would have done something about it.
Anyway, WP comes with plenty of other back up solutions. Now, if CP wants to build a back-up option into future iterations of CP, that’d be great. For me, personally, the number 1 concern is security updates.
As I mentioned, my concern is obviously not about hosting (I just stressed that hosting companies with a WP only focus - such as the one where I am a happy customer now - are still uncertain about how they will deal with CP, it will depend upon demand)
But my concerns are about managing websites and external, easily restorable backups. I had bought and tested BackUpBuddy before coming to BlogVault, and I was not convinced: I encountered issues. I mean here really a reliable backup service, and not merely a plugin. In terms of safety and peace of mind, what BlogVault provides me with is really invaluable. And iControlWP saves me a lot of time with update management.
I agree with you that if CP could develop its own back-up options (possibly as a paid service for supporting CP development), this would be great.
I used a backup plugin many years ago and was horrified to discover that it was keeping copies on the server. Ever since then, I’ve done all my backups manually. It just seems safer.
Side note: Really, no SSL? Let’s Encrypt is free for personal sites, and anyone who is running a business should have a Comodo Instant cert, at the very least. SSL is super easy these days. Totally agree about the quality web hosting, too. I recently shelled out more than I wanted to host my site, but the stellar performance and uptime has been worth every dollar. I hope you can convince this potential client to do business with you.
I have tested ClassicPress with both iThemes BackupBuddy, and with UpDraftPlus. No problems were encountered. Both plugins ran the backups just like they do on WordPress. With BackupBuddy, I was able to send the backup to my Amazon S3 folder.
Been using UpdraftPlus with all my sites, many of which are CP now, and I back them all up daily with it, and there’s no problem at all. No reason there should be, really.