You might believe that your website and other digital assets, are a one-time affair—once they’re set up the way you want them, you don’t need to update them or look after their technical health. However, that isn’t the case. Most websites benefit from a periodic cleanup to enhance their technical health, meet the ever-changing requirements of search engines, and ensure relevance to your audience.
A spring cleaning for your website might reveal possible problems with its technical health. You may not know, for instance, that viewers are leaving your site too quickly due to sluggish load times or bad design. Once you have identified the site’s issues, you can make the required fixes.
In addition, search engines often update their algorithms, leading to updated search ranks. Search engines are businesses too—they need to keep their customers satisfied with the results they return so that they don’t start going somewhere else. Is it time for a spring cleanup for your website? Don’t have an idea where to start? This blog will cover everything. Let’s get started.
Spring Cleanup: Factors To Look After
#1 Update your information and review your website content
If you haven’t refreshed your website’s content in a while, it’s time to do so. Google knows that visitors like new information, so constantly updating your website’s content may provide a much-needed SEO benefit.
Review the website’s content and uncover possibilities to better fit it with the company’s brand image and message. If you have a large amount of material, you should prioritize the most relevant or significant service pages first. Then, start finding blog and article writing possibilities. You’ll also need to review your current content for mistakes in language, spelling, jargon, and punctuation or add any credible facts.
#2 The website’s usability
Do you understand the your target audience’s expectations of your website?
How simple is it for your consumers to do what they want?
Is the website’s navigation as simple and easy as possible?
By assessing your site’s user experience (UX) and determining how it fits within the customer journey, you can make changes that make it simpler for visitors to complete the tasks that they came to your site for. Effective website usability leaves a positive impression on visitors who may become customers and makes completed transactions more likely. It is essential to make the website simple to browse so visitors can easily discover the information they want.
Additionally, it might increase revenues and sales for your firm. For a website to be successful, it must appear attractive and give users a smooth user experience. Hence, this is why usability is essential.
#3 Give your website a fresh look
If it has been a long since you last redesigned your website, it may be time to give it a makeover. A website is not a one-time setup. It must continue to grow with your business and align with current best practice for websites. Too many companies allow their websites to become outdated.
Your company’s branding may evolve over time—it’s worth reviewing your website in line with your style guide to make sure that the site’s design components are aligned with your company’s branding. Alternatively, you may choose a makeover focusing on bringing your website in line with the latest design trends. It’s also a good idea to review your current content and add new information to reflect changes in your service offerings. Finally, also check your website’s loading speed. Your website may be loading more slowly over time, causing customers to give up before they’ve had a chance to see what your site has to offer.
#4 Make Sure all the Links Work
You understand the experience when you visit a website, click a relevant link, and get the terrible 404 page. Broken links are the ultimate disaster for your potential clients. A user’s experience is disrupted when they discover a broken link on your website. This interruption might increase user dissatisfaction as they attempt to find the information they are searching for.
Generally, you should review your website monthly or quarterly for broken links. Occasionally, though, we miss track of the tasks on our to-do checklist, and they are ignored. If you haven’t looked for broken links for a while, now is the ideal opportunity to do so, either by eliminating them entirely or by putting redirects in place.
#5 Check your website’s SSL Certificate
SSL certificates tell your customers’ web browsers that the connection to your site is properly secured. SSL certificates safeguard sensitive information transferred to and from your site. Such information might include login credentials, sign-up details, locations, and transaction or personal data. SSL certificates protect the connection and safeguard your customers’ data from being exploited by malicious parties.
But merely having an SSL certificate doesn’t mean your job is over. SSL certificates feature hard-coded expiry dates. Web browsers will advise their viewers about your website whenever they expire. SSL certificates expire so that your encryption remains updated. After updating your website’s SSL certificate, you will always have the most recent TLS versions and ciphers.
#6 Evaluate and Clarify Your Site’s Calls-to-Action
Calls to action (CTAs) can make or break your company’s website’s ability to bring in revenue. CTAs are intended to encourage visitors to undertake a certain action on your website, so you must ensure that their wording, appearance, and design promote this goal.
Examine the CTAs on your site and ask yourself the following:
● Do you have several calls to action on a page?
● Do these CTAs seem to be inconsistent or unclear?
A call-to-action (CTA) spring cleaning may do miracles for your organic search results, but it could also help you convert more consumers.
Hence, each call to action on the website must:
● Tell visitors what to do
● Explain why they need to do it
● Represent your brand
The most effective calls-to-action look concise, shown as large, prominent buttons, and employing legible fonts and colors. So check on your CTAs to make sure they’re working for you.
#7 Check how your website performs on mobile devices
Mobile will play a significant role in your marketing approach, from functional email templates to mobile-friendly web pages.
In addition to ensuring that your webpage is mobile-friendly, you must also ensure that every page of your site looks great on mobile and that every activity you want your visitors to perform is as simple to complete on a smartphone as it is on a computer.
Conclusion
Periodic website maintenance is essential to ensure that your users have a great experience. Now is the ideal opportunity to have a look at this checklist and ensure that everything is updated. Use this guide to help you perform a spring clean on your site, and get in touch if you need a hand.
