Have you ever searched for a product or service online and felt frustrated as soon as you clicked through to a brand’s website? It’s slow. You can’t find anything you need. There are broken links and design flaws. It looks cheap and unprofessional. It is not optimized for mobile devices. You think, “This can’t be a legit company,” and go to another website to find what you’re looking for. Don’t let this be your website.
Your website is often the first impression of your company (by the way, it only takes the visitor about 50 milliseconds to form an opinion). A functioning, user-friendly website is vital for businesses, and developing a holistic website maintenance plan can help your website stay on top. On the other hand, not doing so can be harmful.
Reading: How to create a website maintenance plan
<img src="https://www.thhundredech.com/tt-mvc/media/TT-Media/Blog/2019-2021/tt-blog-WebsiteMaintenance_tt-Quote.jpg" alt= "In addition, they are an essential part of day-to-day operations for most businesses, and downtime can be costly. Keeping your server up-to-date and working allows you to get on with your work without major disruptions. Websites and servers occasionally need to be taken offline for maintenance. Planned maintenance takes place when a technical operation needs to be performed (e.g. updating the server code) or updates are made to the backend of the website. This is a preventative step to ensure they don't go down at unplanned times or stop altogether. These planned outages rarely last long (as in minutes, as opposed to long-term outages of legacy servers). Much of the process can take place while the website is still active and can be done during periods of low activity. There are many services that will take care of server maintenance for you, but they can get more expensive the more complex your website is. Hosting providers like Digital Ocean offer automated backup and update services, which can be very convenient, but come with a price tag. For smaller businesses, paying the fees might make sense, but as the business (and website) grows, it's worth exploring your options.
Your website maintenance plan should include: Fast updates
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Old websites tend to get a bit sluggish. Sometimes very sluggish. It is important to regularly look for ways to reduce or remove processes that are taking up too much memory in order to deliver the website effectively. A good web maintenance plan outlines the steps to get your website clicking and loading quickly. And this is important for users. In fact, 39% of users will stop engaging with your website immediately if images take too long to load. Decreasing your website loading time improves your organic search engine results and provides a better user experience while navigating the website. Involve your front-end developer or SEO specialist to identify website speed issues and notify your systems engineer or IT staff to fix them.
Your website maintenance plan should include: UX updates
Did you know that 68.1% of all website visits worldwide in 2020 came from mobile devices ? This means that a responsive, mobile-friendly website is more important than ever. How important? Well, 57% of customers say they wouldn’t recommend a business that isn’t mobile friendly, and 50% of customers will stop visiting your website even if they like you as a business. Visuals and site flow are also a pretty big deal. During your regular maintenance, look for broken images, outdated graphics, and other design elements that may hurt your site’s appeal.
Your Frequent Questions About Website Maintenance, Answered
When you start out, it’s normal to have a lot of questions. Here is some information to help you create a website maintenance plan.
What does server under maintenance mean?
A server down is a much bigger deal than a website down. The server is a bigger, more complex, and technically intensive thing compared to the website itself (the website is hosted code, and the server is a physical computer that keeps the website alive). A server under maintenance means that the server is taken offline to fix a major issue. Typical circumstances that require server maintenance include physical problems with the server, an operating system that needs updating, or a hard drive or random access memory (RAM) that needs to be physically installed.
What are some warning signs that my server is in a bad place?
There are two types of server maintenance: proactive and reactive. Proactive maintenance steps are active monitoring to check for problems before they become significant (and should be included in your website maintenance plan). This includes scanning for processes that are consuming a large chunk of server memory and ensuring there are no major security vulnerabilities. Regular checks are an important part of proactive server maintenance, much like a car needs regular oil changes, tire changes, and system checks. Reactive maintenance, on the other hand, occurs when a problem has already occurred and needs to be fixed. These tend to be much more disruptive (remember the Great Playstation Hack of 2011?) and result in downtime that varies depending on the issue and the complexity of the site.
What happens during website maintenance?
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Your designated web maintenance team (usually your IT team, system operators, SEO specialists and those responsible for what appears on the website and how it works ) will perform various tasks periodically. Routine maintenance can be weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly. As a general guideline, you should perform weekly website backups, update content, and check for broken or missing links. Monthly maintenance includes checking your speed, making sure your CMS is in a good place (plugins are updated, etc.) and ensure your pages meet accessibility standards. Quarterly review your website maintenance plan and make any necessary changes, remove unused plug-ins and conduct a thorough website check for broken links and responsiveness. Every year you want to do a database optimization, renew your software subscriptions and domain name, and update your copyright information in your footer. Ad-hoc maintenance can appear when URLs need to be redirected, contact information needs to be updated, or vulnerabilities are discovered.
How much do monthly website maintenance services cost?
A monthly plan can start at $35 and go up to around $5,000 depending on the service provider and your needs. That’s a wide range depending on how much you do in-house, whether you get a holistic package with other web services, how complex your site is, and a variety of other factors. When evaluating a service provider, consider their level of experience, reputation, and additional package offers that can optimize your costs and services. Oftentimes, a holistic approach to website hosting, maintenance, UX, and other services can be more cost-effective than patchwork service providers and separate plans. Your website maintenance plan should include those responsible for every aspect of your website.
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See also: How to Make a Successful Website: 11 Critical Factors
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