In today’s business world, a website that represents your company is paramount to having continuity between the offline and online worlds that we all exist between. You may have had comment that it’s time to update your website, but how do you differentiate that between someone’s opinion and whether it actually requires a redo.
There is no hard and fast rule when it comes to how often you need to update a website, so rather than follow a parameter such as time, instead look at what the needs of your business is going to be over the next few years and whether your current site will fulfil these requirements.
Some questions you can ask in the review process are as follows:
- Are the images representative of the style of customer you wish to attract and the image of your brand/business/team?
- Is the website responsive and able to be optimised to allow for further SEO gains and search engine marketing campaigns (including the build of landing pages)?
- Does it have the information laid out in a way that your potential customer would search for it? If you don’t’ know the answer to this, ask some of your current customers to review the site and tell you how they found the information layout.
- Is social media part of your marketing strategy and does your website allow for live streaming to show the integration of information sharing across all of your content platforms?
- Do you require any new technologies to be included in your site – for example, is your selling strategy moving from more traditional bricks and mortar to online sales – and you’ll require an e-commerce platform to allow for this transition.
- How much content on your site is really necessary and what can be removed to allow for a seamless navigation and your customers finding the important parts quickly?
- Do you have strong call to action buttons on your site – can your customers call directly from your site with a live phone number link? Do you have Live Chat – or wish to include this for instantaneous communication? Is it clear how they should reach you for a quote or the next steps?
- Consider whether you want to include a funnel strategy in your website where you offer something free to a visiting person and you’re then able to gain their information to continue to market to them.
- Overall are you happy when you look online with the way your website sits in the market and your pride over it representing your brand?
While these may seem like a lot of questions to work through take the time to review them so you can make an informed decision about whether to update your website or not. Be sure to review best practice on websites and see what else is out there to source inspiration. By having a solid understanding of what your business goals are over the next 2-3 years, you’re then able to build a site that will give you longevity and support these goals. Additionally, you’ll be able to brief your web developer thoroughly which should assist in keeping costs down and development times faster as they know what they need to deliver on from the start!
Good luck with reviewing your website and making a decision on whether it’s time to make the change!
