The million dollar question in the world or websites is: how do you know when your site needs to be updated?
Just because you had a brand new site built a few years ago, doesn’t mean that you are done. The problem is that the Internet is constantly changing and technology is always on the move. What was new and high-tech last year is old hat this year.
So if you want to keep ahead of the competition, you need a modern, classy website that is user-friendly and suits your customers’ expectations. Here are a few pointers that will tell you whether your website needs to be revamped:
- Speed: If your website takes too long to load, visitors will vote with their feet. Today, you need a website that loads in two seconds or less.
- Content: If your content is old and outdated, and doesn’t engage and interest your visitors, you will lose customers.
- “Enter” pages: Don’t make visitors click something to enter your site – that is really outdated and a waste of your visitors’ time.
- Flash: Anything built in Adobe Flash is too old and too slow – so get rid of it. Search engines can’t read flash either, so your SEO will be very poor. Flash is on the way out as a technology.
- Images: If you have text (such as headings) saved as images, search engines can’t read it properly. This affects your SEO and can make your ranking plummet.
- Visual pollution: If you have flashing fonts, scrolling sidebars and a hit counter, you really do need a new website.
- Clutter: If your visitors need a GPS and a packed lunch to find their way around your website, then you are leaving money on the table. Today’s websites are clutter free and designed to guide users throughout the content.
- You don’t have a CMS: If you can’t edit your website content yourself without special skills, then you will waste valuable time and money hiring someone to do that for you. Modern sites have an easy to edit content management system (CMS) that are a breeze to use.
- Your business has changed: It doesn’t take long for your business to evolve. New products and services, new staff, new branding — all of these things may be a reason to look critically at your website and ask yourself whether it still fits your business.
- It’s simply old: Yep, this is a valid reason to look at a new website. While there’s no point revamping your website just for the sake of it (especially if your customers are highly familiar with it), there are always means of improving your website. That may be new technology, new imagery, linking your site to another system, and so on. Can your website be improved if you were to look at it again today?
These are just some of the signs that your website needs a serious shot in the arm. So if your website needs CPR or you want more information on SEO and website design in Brisbane, call GO Creative on (07) 3333 2932 or request a free quote online.
