Much like a car and regular servicing, your website will require routine maintenance throughout its life. Sites contain lots of little moving parts that are integrated within one another and rely on each piece to be functioning correctly. If a website it is not regularly maintained it is also vulnerable to security flaws. If you plan to manage your site, keep reading for some essential items that require your attention.
Websites are made up of a core framework, and then often different plugins that are responsible for different things. It is essential to regularly check for updates for your plugins and your core site framework. Updates will usually contain security patches, and promptly applying updates to your site will close the window for any intruders. When new vulnerabilities are discovered in common web frameworks, hackers will scan the internet for sites that are vulnerable—you want to make sure your site isn't on their list. Throughout the year, we have had many old websites, and unmaintained sites fall victim to hacks and malware, and the threats are ever-changing and evolving. Owning a website is not set and forget, and prevention is the key.
Websites can go down from time to time, and there are endless possibilities and causes of this inconvenience. Part of maintaining your website is ensuring you monitor the up and downtime of the site and are the first to know your site is down. This insight also includes monitoring the speed of the site upon load, which is an important aspect to keep an eye on as 47% of customers expect a website to load in two seconds, and 40% will abandon the visit if it takes more than three seconds to load.
A variety of analytics tools will track your visitors’ journey through your website, as well as provide insight into how successfully ads, videos, social tools, devices, and other channels are driving traffic to your website and accomplishing goals. Keeping an eye on traffic trends can be an early indicator of how changes affect your site and can also alert you to a problem—sudden declines in a metric will usually indicate the onset of a problem with a marketing channel or technology change. It’s important to keep an eye on this data to see opportunities and threats to the success of your website goals.
If you are time poor, or unsure about how to carry out your own Website Maintenance, speak to the team by calling 9786 0938 or emailing reach@modernvisual.com.au and we can set you up with our Modern Visual Maintenance Package, guaranteed to keep your website investment in top shape.