• Spring 2009 Newsletter Home
• It is Time for Some Spring Cleaning!
• Prep Your Site for Tourism Season
• BigforkWEB Services

It is Spring! The birds are chirping, the grass is turning green, the rivers are rising, it has finally stopped snowing in Montana and your website is due for a good cleaning!

Have you ever been searching online to purchase a product and come across a website that has what you want, but you notice that there is still a news item under current events on the home page from 2006? Do you still feel confident in this company, their content and their shopping cart security if it looks like they are not updating their site?

It is important to keep everything on your website up-to-date. Web users are constantly judging your company by your site and comparing it to your competitor's website. Do not give them a reason to think twice about choosing your company.

Update Your Contact Information

Even if you are an avid updater of your website, there may be pages that slipped by you when your phone number changed right before the chaos of the holidays or your business moved recently and you just plain forgot to update your site to reflect the move. Take some time to look through your site and make sure all of your address, phone numbers, emails (including forms that are submitted via email) and all other contact information is updated.

Update Your Content

Do you have a new product or service that is not currently on your website? Your site is a great marketing tool. Make sure all that you have to offer is displayed and displayed well.

Have your team or any company policies changed? If you have that information on your website, make sure it is up-to-date. Do you have upcoming events or current news displayed on your site? Make sure those are current as well. Is there anything you can add to your site that will benefit your users? If you have a real estate website with listings, do you have a mortgage calculator or info about the area for those relocating? Do you have frequent questions that can be addressed through articles, blog posts or forums to better inform your clients? Are you selling other people's services in different areas that may be searched for and displayed on a personalized Google map? Do you have frequent community events that you could share with your users on a calendar?

Update Your Look

Honestly, does your website look like it just stepped out of the 90s? Do you have rotating gifs (dancing babies), a 600px wide template with a neon pink background, a pointless flash intro or a large "Welcome to our Website" title on the home page? If you answered yes to any of these, pick up the phone and call 406.837.3334, because you need an update!

Update Your Code

Have you ever purchased a cell phone and a week later, there is a newer and much better version? That is just technology - it is always updating! Just as physical technologies such as cell phones and computers are constantly updating their technology to be better, more useful and faster, so are websites. If your website was created 5 years ago, it is probably time to have it re-coded with more modern technologies such as use of cascading style sheets (CSS) over table layout and updated html. The newer technology will allow your site to load faster, be more accessible to search engines and be more in-line with current W3C web standards.

Clean Out Old Files

It is easy for files to build up over the years. If you have documents or pages on your site that you no longer use or need, remove them from your server. Unused files take up unnecessary space and can cause confusion in the future when there are too many files that are not being used.

Update Social Networking Sites

Do you have a Facebook or Twitter page for your company? Make sure you are keeping those updated. You can help keep fresh content on your Facebook page by feeding your RSS feeds from your blog through your Facebook page.