Many think that once they have made and launched the website online, it's to be done and get over with. But, that is never the case. Maintaining and Updating is a constant cycle which needs run continuously. It is not about just having a clean design and uploading random content stuff without taking care of other website maintenance responsibilities.
Every aspect of life that you acquire needs some sort of maintenance to keep it going. That is why your cars, air conditioners and even little appliances of daily use need cleaning or servicing.
Why is it Important to Maintain a Website?
1. Search Engine Optimization
It is common knowledge that if you need to drive traffic to your website, have more customers and run your business successfully, keeping your website updated is without question one of the most important steps to be taken.
Google plays a huge role in it as well. It ranks website on the basis of relevance as well as how updated the website is on their search engine page. They have the power to de-index your website if it is not being updated by you or if in some way it is infected by malware. So, ideally you need to keep your website regularly updated with current content, news, keywords, and articles in order to rank well in search results. Regularly website maintenance is invaluable for SEO strategy.
2. Engagement with Customers
Potential Customers are those who have been visiting your website through which it it gaining traffic. You know what losing a customer 101? If they find it hard to be able to find what they are looking for, current information and relevant content while using the website. By going the extra mile, making sure that you are using the correct grammar as well as typos and using the correct, relevant information engages the customers.
3. More Security
Do you know what's another thing that is important? With website maintenance on your radar, if the website is storing any form of customer information, it would mean that it is exposed and not secured enough. While using any kind of platform to upload or build your website on, a responsible person would ensure to install regular software updates as well as security patches. It can be easy and attractive for hackers to find and target websites that have sat dormant for too long.
4. ' Image '
As everyone has become a know it all at an early age, it has becomes simpler to create as well as design a website that looks professionally built. So, naturally there is an expectation for a professional website from professional companies. If in case the website that gained a number of clients by offering a professional outlook but does not deliver on that promise, you might not end up losing just that particular customer, but many.
5. Because, why not?
If you are creating a website, think if your business needs it and not according to every single person who is operating is the similar domain has it or not. In this manner, a website becomes a very important element of your business. It can only be a valuable asset to your company if ut runs smoothy and is up-to-date and in case, if it is not in a good state, it can cost you dearly. Once you are behind on your maintenance needs, it can be quite the process to bring the website back up to speed.
6. Keeping up with the Technology and Trends
The sleeker your website is, the more you’ll convince potential customers that you are their ultimate and best option. You will only have the opportunity to be an early adopter of new website technology if you stay on top of your website maintenance. It even caters to the back-end run more smoothly. If you install the software updates regularly, you will definitely be able to take advantage of new features that install along with the updates.
Tips & Tricks through time
1. Weekly
- Keeping a check on pages if they are loading with errors
- Running a backup to make sure that previous version of your site is stored
- Making updates to website software and plugins
- Seeing if all the forms uploaded are running properly
- Removing any sort of spam content from the website
- Checking if the pages have any kind of broken links attached
- Searching for 404 errors and fix or redirect
- Writing blog posts to keep the community engaged which encourages SEO traffic.
2. Monthly
3. Quarterly
4. Yearly
Tips & Tricks through time
1. A Backup
This is a must and supposed to be done without taking any gaps i.e. regularly. Especially if you own an online store with an e-commerce element that is set in place.
2. Updating the Website content
The content on a website has a lot of elements which compliment one another in order to give the viewers a wholesome experience. It may comprise of elements like images, written text, paid or free downloads, typographies, and videos, etc. and you must use the elements that are relevant and will help dragging the attention of new visitors to such quirks. This transforms them into potential clients.
3. Product Updates
- You will need to keep announcing or adding new products frequently.
- Whenever you add any product or service, you must add a page or sitemap. Such navigations should be uploaded alongside other elements
- It in case you have a blog, then a sidebar for navigation meaning any updates that are added by you will be updated in that area, - If you want to excuse or discontinue products or services, announcing such kind of news is considered a good practice that would be replacing them on the side navigation bar.
- Changing the rates is something that may require an announcement too as this may help in spurring rush sales too.
4. A news bulletin
Adding the most recent reviews about your website. A review may be about your website or products; this practice from them is known as social proof and helps you in showing off to your website visitors by sharing with them what others have to say about your website, its products, and services.
5. Bargains
People love free stuff! Giving out freebies, going for a giveaway or contesting from time to time can be classified as a good approach. It helps in creating some sort of buzz and popularity among the masses about the ongoing sales and promotions that may be taking place on your website. Updating outdated content shall, therefore, be always on your website maintenance plan. This approach will send a strong message to your visitors that you hold an unshakable grip on the subject.
6. Featured Conditions
It is natural that getting a website built for your business would require a chunk of money from you and in order to fulfil other needs, you may have to turn it down a notch, comprising the quality. It is again natural that those funds may turn up at the desired level in future and through later stages, you can allow inclusions of such products and services in the website. A frequent checking approach may help you to see if there is any space or room for improvement ( there always is ) perhaps you may add some of those items that were left out previously. It may also be some feedback from your clients which may require prompt action and implementation.
- The reported broken links must be fixed.
- If the site does not already have one, adding blogs will prove helpful.
- Subscribing to the social media channels may require addition social buttons and relevant links to those social profiles.
- Adding an ‘FAQ’ ( Frequently Aked Questions ) section as that may help in brings down the volume of emails and phone calls with these frequent and identical questions.
7. Website Monitoring
There are many tools available on the internet which help you to notify if there is anything that went wrong on your website. It is better to have such tools available and in use rather than having people emailing you coldly about how your website is not working. Such tools regularly track your website up and downtime and sends you a notification so that you can take necessary actions.8. Domain Registration Check
Keeping a close watch on your domain's expiry date is the one things that slips from everyone's mind even though it is not supposed to. You can check such information with the help of service providers like WHOIS. You must also ensure that WHOIS.com is showing right and accurate information about your business, i.e. your business name, address and other relevant data associated with your business website.
9. Speed Test of the website
This is probably one of the most important elements of the website which is crucial. In the fast life of today, visitors will always be short of time, if they realized that your website is slow in efficiency and speed they will simply pop out because the word ‘wait’ will always be missing in their dictionary. So, avoid this trend and tendency if your goal is to rule Dubai markets.
10. Software Updates
If you use a third party software and ecommerce software i.e. Joomla, OpenCart and WordPress, etc., then you must keep in mind that they update their software regularly. If you forget to update your own website with it, that may end up affecting your website’s functionality or performance. You must, therefore, keep a close check on these updates and must shape things accordingly in order to ensure smoother proceedings.
11. Improving Compatibility
A pre requisite of getting a website built is that it should work perfectly well on different browsers. And that is because not all users access can access the website from the same browsing application. Compatibility is considered the key for cross-browser is essential to be ensured for augmented usability. It simply means that the website must support different browsers such as Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, Opera, and Netscape, along with Internet Explorer.
Many modified CSS capabilities support prominent browsers, but a few are not recognized. So, it is important to maintain websites for having more browser compatibility.
12. Website Responsiveness
It is no news that tech gadgets are continouosly being transformed over the years from large screens to tiny tablets and smartphones. According to a rough estimation, more than 67% of users prefer to buy a product or service from mobile responsive websites. It clearly indicates that you should pay increased attention to maintain a mobile-friendly website.
Spider India is a recognized firm working in Chennai, India. It is a mobile app development company which would answer to your all kinds of application needs. We have a dedicated team for design as well as development for the app. Communicate with us, tell us your requirements and we will come up with the right solutions. Making specialized apps for your company and providing unforgettable services is our motive. We help make your digital aspirations a reality. From developing an application, communicating and implementing your own creativity and providing the best marketing strategies for the success of your application is what we strive to give. Our past customers have been really happy with our services. We believe in constant growth, we believe in continuous improvement since no one is perfect but we also believe that your product can be perfect.
When every aspect of the business is already a risk, why take one more and remain ambiguous?
