Many business owners don’t give their website much attention after it’s been built and published. For whatever reasons their website becomes a static brochure that fulfils a very basic role. But, making regular updates and changes to your website is good no matter how small those changes may be. Making changes gives search engines something new to index and shows them that you are active on your site. These changes can also help keep repeat visitors engaged as it gives their eye something new to see, read, and maybe click on. Finally, some changes just make your website run better. Here is a list of updates and changes you can easily and inexpensively enact on a regular basis.
The Obvious Stuff
The obvious stuff is… well … obvious. I really shouldn’t have to say much about the obvious stuff, but I will. Obviously, the obvious stuff includes ANYTHING NEW! Things like new products or services should be added to appropriate pages. You can also throw a little highlight section on your index page or sidebar announcing the new stuff.
New employees are pretty easy to add to your “About Us” page. Or, if you just fired someone, you may want to take that person off the “About Us” page. Which brings up a good point: modifying and updating your website isn’t always about adding data. Your website should be accurate and relevant, so remove dusty old content.
Have you moved to a new location or added a new office or painted the walls of your existing office? Great! Take a pic and post it on your sidebar. Write a sentence or two about it. Show visitors that you are excited about the changes in your business and they are more likely to be excited.
Here are a few other ideas from Captain Obvious: Did you change your logo? DId you get new menus? Did you color your hair? Did a member of your staff have a baby? Did you get a new client or account? Have you switched vendors? Has a product been discontinued?
Content Edits
Once a month pay the $20 or $30 it costs to have one of your web pages edited for grammar, spelling, flow, content, and maybe even basic SEO. This task is particularly advisable if you developed your own website copy. I don’t care if you consider yourself a literary genius. Have someone else, preferably a professional, edit your website copy. You will slowly get your content to a very presentable state as well as keep the search engines and visitor engaged.
New Website Tech
This suggestion is for WordPress users. Try implementing a new technology on your website. There are thousands of WordPress plugins available and they are typically very easy to install. Adding some of the following tech is easy, it will make small changes to your content, and even if it has no tangible impact on your business it doesn’t hurt anything.
- Newsletter Subscription – Get a newsletter account (Constant Contact, Campaign Monitor, Mail Chimp, etc) to start building mailing list. Most of the big players have plugins designed for WP, so all you have to do is install it and put the widget on your sidebar.
- Social Network Sharing – There are dozens of plugins that are easy to configure and allow visitors to share your website by adding icons to the page.
- Performance Enhancement – This doesn’t change the visual look of your site as much as the speed. A few popular and effective plugins are WP Smush for images, Hummingbird Page Speed Optimization, WP Fastest Cache.
- Security – If you don’t have security plugins on your website, you should. The basic plugins I like to start with are WordFence, Bad Behaviour, and Contact Form 7 Honeypot.
Ad Image Captions
Again, this if for WordPress users. Image captions allow the author to put a description of an image typically below the image on a web page. This is a good way to add content to a page and give more information to the viewer about what they are seeing. For example, if you have a product that has multiple images showing the product from different angles or in different scenarios, the caption could be very useful.
Highlight Someone Else
I’m a big fan of this one because no individual, no business is an island. We all must rely on others to do what we do. And if we like the businesses or clients or neighbors that help make our business better, then why not show a little love. It can be as simple as throwing a small thank you box on your sidebar with a link to the company that delivers your products. Or, if you’re feeling particularly gracious, you can write a blog page about them. Whatever it is, recognize someone else.
This is just a small sampling of ideas that should be fairly accessible to most business owners or managers. Just remember that your web presence can be a living, breathing entity that changes and moves and helps your business connect with the world. Don’t neglect it.
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