Website maintenance: DIY vs web developer – which is right for your business?
Ongoing maintenance is an essential part of owning a website, and if this is neglected you can seriously endanger the reputation of your business. Some of the problems you may encounter if you ignore maintaining your website can range from broken links and outdated content, to aggressive hacks and lost customers. Whether you maintain your website yourself or you decide to outsource this to a web developer depends on your budget, time and skills.
The first major consideration is that when things go wrong with websites, they can quickly escalate out of control. Trying to find a web developer to urgently fix your site can be difficult, costly and time consuming. The investment in a web developer to manage your website will pay itself back time and time again and is definitely a business expense that is worth considering.
Some of the maintenance jobs that a web developer will keep on top of for your website include the following:
- Update all of your plugins, as necessary.
- Ensure that no clashes occur between your plugins.
- Monitor your plugins and your theme to ensure that they are all secure.
- Fix any problems that do occur.
- Monitor and update your keywords, website content and technical data.
- Improve the speed of your website, so it loads faster.
- Enhance the design and functionality of your website.
- Design new graphics, banners and call to action buttons.
- Provide recommendations on your content, design and navigation.
- Add keywords to your headings, links and other content.
- Set up and install Google Analytics on your website.
- Set up a sitemap and submit it to the search engines.
- Add or update your Google Business listing (including Google maps and Google plus).
As you can see, this is a lot of work that will take up a lot of your time and some of it is highly specialised. For example, what are you going to do if you update one of your plugins and your website crashes? A web developer can properly test the compatibility of these updates with your website and other plugins, before updating the plugin on your live website.
If you were to neglect your car and avoid paying for regular services, eventually you’ll be faced with an inoperable car and a hefty repair bill. Owning a website is no different, but if your website is inoperable, your entire business can suffer.
At GO Creative we offer a monthly website management service that keeps your website, plugins and software running at peak performance, generating leads and helping you to rank higher in the search engines. Phone 07 3333 2932 or request an instant quote for more information about our monthly website maintenance services.
