In today’s world, maintaining your website properly and keeping it updated all the time is vital to boost your image on the web because today’s online customers will most likely visit your site before contacting you for any product or service.
Your website should be able to make a perfect first impression. It should be able to generate a good amount of traffic. It should act as sales team for your business. It has to be impressive so that it compels your visitors to stay on your website longer as well as make purchases.
Many companies create beautiful websites but then fail to maintain and update them on a regular basis. They fail to realize that if their website is outdated as well as unresponsive, they would lose credibility as well as sales. So if you have made a significant investment in your website, then you should get a professional to maintain it on a regular basis.
To help you understand, we’ve outlined below our top 5 pitfalls that could happen if you don’t run your sites security updates.
Keep Your Website Secure
With businesses and consumers relying more and more on the internet to sell and purchase products, the issue of security becomes increasingly crucial. One of the main components of website maintenance is keeping your website’s security measures are always up-to-date. Keeping your website security updated protects your site and the information collected from customers from hacker attacks. The security of your business’s website plays a role in your SEO ranking as well. It can be said that performing security updates as part of your website maintenance can be beneficial for both SEO and ensures your target audience your site is always secure and trustworthy.
Improves User Experience
With all the competition in the online marketplace, if your website is confusing or hard to use your business is likely losing potential customers because of it. When you perform website maintenance on your business website, your site is constantly improving and becoming easier to use. These improvements encourage users to engage and stay on your website longer. In conclusion, maintaining your website is beneficial as it helps improve the user experience of your site and encourages user engagement.
Decreased Speed
There’s a reason for new releases. Each release comes with various performance improvements that make your website more efficient. When you visit a site, and it takes too long to load – do you get impatient and navigate off? Website performance goes hand-in-hand with conversions and site results. Speed also has an impact on SEO. For this reason, utilize tools like YSlow, or Google Page Speed Insights to review your site speed and determine what is causing the slower load.
Brand Awareness and Trust
No matter how nice your site is, your audience can tell if it is not maintained. A website that is not maintained may cause users to lose trust which in turn can affect the awareness of your brand. Keeping up with your website maintenance may seem unimportant compared to other tasks, but it can make all of the difference when a user is deciding whether to purchase from you or a competitor.
Software Updates
Most websites today – even though they are easy to edit – are complex software applications. Just like the operating system on your computer, they need to be kept up to date for security and performance reasons. In WordPress websites, this means regularly updating the core software as well as any plugins and themes (there is generally at least one official WordPress update every month). When doing so, always perform a backup first. That way, if there’s a hiccup, you can roll back to a working site version.
Conclusion
Trying to handle your own website maintenance is like trying to fix your own car. Sure, some people are equipped to do it, but most people are better off leaving it to professionals. After all – the success of your website and your business rides heavily on your website being a valuable source of information. Don’t let it slip by the wayside. We offer a full range of business website support services, including content updates, website maintenance, technical support, and business website hosting. If you’re interested in a maintenance contract for your website, contact us to learn how you can have professionals keep your site in proper working order.
