Your new website is live. What’s next?
filed under: Website Design, Website Optimization
It’s easy to think of websites as static and to think that you’re done once your new site is launched. And no doubt, you should take time to celebrate your success when you publish your new site (we know it's way too easy to miss this step)!
So what happens after the new site is launched and you’re done celebrating?? We’re glad you asked! We’re here to offer up some essential steps you’ll want to consider to keep your website in top shape (especially if you’re a busy business owner without a full-time content team or SEO consultant).
Add content consistently
Since your website isn’t static, it will need regular content updates. Your website users will expect that and search engines like new website content too. People are more likely to click on a new blog post, rather than a content piece that you wrote long ago, and how often Google visits and indexes pages on your site is based partially on how often your site content changes. If you update content more frequently, Google will notice and may index your pages more often. Adding new content also gives you new opportunities to optimize for SEO keywords.
Content calendars are great tools to help you stay on track with making regular content updates. Think realistically about how often you can add new content to the site and do your best to stick to that schedule.
Keep your software up to date
This is super important! Outdated software can lead to website hacks. It can also cause things to break on your site.
For platforms like Wordpress, updates to Wordpress core, plugins and themes are being rolled out regularly so getting into a regular cadence of running software updates will help you avoid headaches down the road.
Review your Google Analytics 4 data regularly
The best way to find out how people are interacting with your new website is to keep an eye on Google Analytics 4 (GA4). Your GA4 data can help you answer questions like what return you’re getting on your ad spend, if people are visiting the main pages on your site and what types of website traffic have the highest engagement rate. If you like data, GA4 is a good opportunity to geek out a bit.
Like many things, GA4 becomes just another tool unless you use it regularly. We suggest getting into a regular cadence of reviewing your GA4 data - once a month or once a quarter can both be good options. Identify a few key questions you want to answer (such as the questions above) and spend a little time (even just 30 minutes) reviewing a few key GA4 reports to get answers.
Review Google Search Console
Google Search Console is a helpful free tool that shows you how Google sees your website and alerts you to any issues that may be impacting how you’re appearing in Google search results. It’s a good tool to review regularly to get that overall look at how Google sees your site and to address any issues that need attention.
Set up website backups
Just like backing up your computer, backing up your website is also important. If you need to roll back major changes on the site or if the site gets hacked, having a backup available gives you a way to restore it.
Website hosts sometimes include backups as part of their hosting service - it’s a good idea to double check if yours does. We also recommend setting up a second backup, in case the first one fails for some reason.
The cadence of backups depends somewhat on how often you’re making changes to your site.. Daily or weekly backups are often good options and keeping the backups for 60 days is smart.
Learn a little SEO
It’s a good idea to learn some SEO basics. We’ve done the hard work for you here and here. Read up on our posts so you can get some traction with SEO without giving up your day job to do it.
We know this can feel like a lot. But you don’t have to do it alone!
If you’d like a little help, here are some high impact tasks we can take off your plate:
- Develop a website content plan (and content calendar).
- Keep your software up to date.
- Set up GA4 and help you understand GA4 reports.
- Set up Google Search Console and help you understand Google Search Console reports.
- Set up website backups for you.
- Teach you some of the ropes of SEO so that you can run with it on your own.
Ready to learn more? Contact Emily.