Top 10 Tips for your Website
13 Jan 2012
It is a good time to reflect and consider how you might improve your fortunes in 2012, we have put together 10 key points every website owner should consider right now to ensure they maximise their chances in 2012.
Welcome to 2012, couple weeks in and we are all returning to our usual weekly routines back at work after the festive break.
It is a good time to reflect and consider how you might improve your fortunes in 2012, we have put together 10 key points you should consider right now to ensure you maximise your chances in 2012.
#1 Love your site !
Are you proud of your site? Do you bore your mates with it down the pub, at the coffee shop or church on Sunday! Every business owner should love their website as much as their business. If you don’t love it and give it attention no-one else will.
#2 When did you last update it
Be honest is your site up to date, does it have your latest news, new products, latest service or details of your most recent projects. If not, update it now, if updating it is a big deal then you really must upgrade it to use a decent content management system. The EonicWeb5 CMS is superb for the job costs from as little as £ 25 a month with full support and on-going updates. www.eonic.co.uk If you don’t love your website enough to spend £ 25 a month on it then stop reading now.
#3 Does it look wow and now
Or is your website wearing last season’s clothes? Or god forbid bell bottomed jeans and a happy mondays tee-shirt! Standards and best practice in web design evolve in the same way as fashion, continually being updated with new ideas on aesthetics and usability. A new design needn’t cost an arm and a leg. A wide range of off-the-shelf templates are available that can quickly be modified with your logo and colour scheme. Take a look at this season’s collection here http://themes.eonicweb.com and see if this seasons off the peg is better than a tired old designer gear.
#4 Set Clear Goals
Now to start thinking strategically, be really clear about what the site is to achieve. It is only when you have got that down will you know how to get there. Write them down and stick it somewhere where you will be reminded every day.
#5 Measure, Measure, Measure
If you don’t have Google Analytics setup on your site do it now. Then pick 5 things to measure and track that will give you a clear indication of the site performance, such as:
- Number of sales leads generated
- Number of visits on the site
- Current website position in Google – (setup an account with www.webposition.com)
- Number of visits from searches for your top 5 keywords
- Conversions ( leads against visitors )
#6 Analyse
Set aside an hour every month to review your statistics and figure out what they mean. Then decide on actions to take that month to improve on them, do it then measure again. If you don’t have the time, discipline or desire to get under the skin of this then get a professional to do it for you, if you are measuring the results you will know if money spent is cost effective. Eonic provide an excellent Web Performance Management service for our clients.
#7 Catch the next wave
The web is evolving at lightning speed, keep your ear to the ground for the latest trends, try them out, have a play and see what works. Always making sure to measure and analyse every new thing you try.
#8 Engage with Social Networks
If your business is not on Facebook / Linked In / Twitter then by now it really should be, you are missing a massive opportunity to raise awareness and build relationships. Also find out about “Social Bookmarking” make sure each page of your site has facebook like, tweet this and Google +1 buttons, if this is jargon to you, then give Eonic a call!
#9 Get Found
You’ve got the content of your site just right, your page titles match your ideal search terms, you site is peppered with keywords but that is not enough. To get well ranked nowadays backlinks are the thing, relevant links from well-respected websites back to yours are search engine gold dust, put in place a plan right now.
#10 Keep it up
Like all new year’s initiatives, you start off with the best intensions. But to really get results, then doing the right stuff needs to become a habit. Once you are getting results you can measure this becomes a joy not a chore and if it is just not your thing then delegate or outsource whatever you do don’t ignore it.
If you would like to discuss how Eonic might help you with the performance of your website this year give us a call today on 01892 534044.
Written by Trevor Spink, Managing Director of Eonic.co.uk one of Kent’s leading website design companies.