We have been in touch with clients and prospective clients that seem to be waiting for something to happen in their business before creating or updating their website. Maybe it's a new product they are excited about offering and don't want to change their website because the product will only be available for a short time. Well, time passes and changes to the site are never made and your website visitors never know about it. Or people don't go to the website because the site is usually the same as the last time they visited. And since the website doesn't reflect your business currently, you stop referring people to it and defeat the purpose of having a website.
Coming soon pages
Some websites have pages that say, "coming soon". This may be meant as a good intention or to let the visitor know that work is being done, but why make someone click on something that has no content? We have a client that is finally adding content to that "coming soon" page after over a year. If you have "coming soon" pages on your website for any length of time, remember that visitors may click to the page once or twice, but after awhile they just may not come back at all.
Need ideas for site updates or content?
Here are some ideas for content that can easily be added to any website:
- Customer testimonials or product reviews
- Awards or accolades received
- Press releases or articles written or published
- Images or pictures of your projects, products or staff
- Free tips, advice or daily quotes which may keep website visitors coming back
- Latest news about your products, services or industry
- Audio podcast so visitors can listen as well as view
We get more calls for doing web site re-design and website maintenance than we do for creating new websites.
This is probably because so many small businesses have created websites at some point but have not planned for what to do after the site is up.
Maintaining your website takes planning, effort and time. A successful website almost always is kept current with the business and its offerings and services. Many web design companies can offer affordable plans to keep your website current and up to date. They may also offer administration for parts of the site that need to be changed regularly. This enables you the client to make changes whenever they like, reducing the amount of time you have to involve your Webmaster.
A website is similar to a retail store
When a retail store has a sale or special, they will change the way things look so when you walk in, things look different from the last time you were there. So when you visit the store, it's obvious that something new and exciting is going on. Your customers will know that you really care about them and are providing a unique experience that reflects the stores current services or products.
Website Findability
Another reason for website updates is that search engines will see that a site has been updated regularly and will usually rank the site accordingly. Why would a search engine rank a site high if the site hasn't been updated in months or even years? If I am searching for the latest information on a subject, product or service, I want results that are current.
A website is a living breathing thing. Well, ideally it is anyway. It needs care and feeding if it is expected to produce positive results. No matter how much planning is done in the creation of a website, things may change in your industry and business which will demand changes to the website.
Change can be good
So just like the retail store that has to change it's look on a regular basis to keep attracting customers, a successful website must do the same.
