It’s like a puppy! Cute and fluffy at the start. Then it poops on your carpet! Whoops, realization kicks in. It’s going to take regular care and maintenance or it’ll die… No, I’m not still talking about the puppy, I’m talking about your website.
To get the most out of that website you will need to look after it, feed it, play with it and groom it. Like all puppies, it needs that attention from you. Websites can quickly become out of date in a flash. Without being promoted with fresh content, and up to date, they become static and boring. Not enabling your customers to convert into sales. So give in to those puppy eyes, and follow the below few steps in which can help your site stay fresh.
Update the damn thing!
The average human being has a very short attention span. So when old mate Tim visits your page he will make the decision to carry on looking through your site within the first 3 seconds. So keep your site looking clean, fresh and up to date with the latest content. Be that updated images or even a recent blog. You haven’t much time to grab the attention of old Timmy and if your site looks neglected, it’ll give your customers the impression that they might be as well.
Peek at others!
You know what they say, “keep your friends close, and your enemies closer!”. The same goes for your site, look at what your competition does, do something they are not doing, heck even copy them and do it better. This is a good way to compare the conditions of your site, is your site working for you? or is time to groom it up and redesign it to match/ better others in the market!?
Understand what your customer goes through!
If you own an eCommerce site, the most important function on it is that sweet sweet purchase function the one that ads zero’s to your account. If it at any time it’s glitchy, difficult to process a purchase or even stops working in some cases it can severely impact your ability to make sales.
This is why it’s a good thing to go through and test it! Understand what your customer goes through to purchase an item. is it a smooth ride with relatively no clicks, glitches, etc? My main point here is it user-friendly? Does it not allow the customer to rethink there purchase before it’s done!
This should be tested every couple of months to iron out any kinks in the processes. Heck, go buy stuff online somewhere else, treat your self and call it a testing experience to learn what others do compare to you…
Make sure it’s secure.
This darn age anyone who runs a website or has one has to make sure it’s bloody secure from unauthorized people! It’s 2019 it should be a given.
It’s so important to ensure your data is secure and more important that your customer’s data is secure! You need to be running security tests on your site every month be it by scans, paying hackers to try break-in, or just plain making sure your data is still the same as before and nothing out of the unusual is in place.
It can also be as easy as updating a plugin to ensure it’s secure this can take all of 5 – 10 minutes at times. And can save you on a lot of terrible stress.
Back it up.
Ever been writing a document on Microsoft Word and never hit save and the PC crash? suddenly hours of hard work all lost. This can happen when you do stuff to your site, update plugins, images, text. Even let’s say a hacker wipes it all. It is good practice before updating stuff to back a version of your site up, so if all goes pear-shaped you can always resort it back and go again!
Make sure you put it in your calendar every month to back your site up!
If your ready to make the commitment by looking after that puppy, make sure you are with your site. The more you nourish it, train it and feed it. The more you get back out of it as well.
Already have a site and cannot find the time in your busy life to maintain it? even just add some new content that you have been meaning to do for a while now?
We offer hourly rates to do this for you! If you purchase more than 2 hours or more per month you get an extra for free! Find out more by contacting us via email or Facebook!
