Most people assume that web design and content creation is the most critical part of website management. However, it is important to understand that websites cannot be just launched and forgotten about.
Websites are dynamic and require regular checks and maintenance to keep them secure and ensure that your site is up-to-date, free of any issues and that the SEO is fully optimised.
Below, you can find six steps for performing a monthly website check-up. But remember you can also create a yearly, quarterly, or even weekly checklist to keep your website healthy and fully optimised.
Six Website Checks
1. Site load speed test
It is no myth that speedy sites enhance user experience and benefit your search engine rankings. There are several free tools you can use to get insights regarding your site speed, including GTmetrix and Google PageSpeed insights. These tools give your websites a “speed score” and list opportunities and recommendations that will help you enhance your website.
Not sure how to fix your errors? Our devs are on standby to decipher them for you!
2. Security scan
Security scanning can identify your website’s security vulnerabilities; this way, you can review them and fix the issues immediately. Be aware of any expired security certificates as this may lead to unwanted interference such as hackers and viruses, which can be a considerable threat to the data you are storing.
There are several tools, both paid and free, which can be used to scan and assess your site’s security, including Acutinex, Wordfence, Scan My Server, and Mozilla Observatory.
3. Updating Plugins
If you are using a CMS platform such as WordPress, you are likely using several plugins. These plugins will need to be updated regularly. For most platforms, this is done automatically; however, it is still important to manually check and make sure that everything is updating and running smoothly.
4. Regular site analytics review
Your site’s analytics can be very insightful. Tools like Google Analytics, Woopra and Mint will show you information such as user behaviours on your website, how users are finding your site, how engaged users are with your content, and even what device they are browsing on.
This information will help you identify how well your site is performing and areas which require further improvement.
5. Check SEO analytics
Checking your SEO analytics can keep you informed about your keywords positioning, help identify new opportunities, and highlight errors. This will help you rethink your SEO strategy, which will ultimately optimise your site, and improve rankings and conversions.
Here is a quick checklist to ensure that you have covered everything:
- Look for the search volume and difficulty of the keywords in your site
- Check pages which are ranked highly on Google for high traffic keywords
- Check the keywords you have gained or lost
- Check backlinks you have gained and lost
- Check for referring domains you have gained and lost
- Look at your organic traffic
- Analyse broken backlinks and internal links
6. Google Webmaster Central Blog to stay updated
Google uses set rules when ranking pages, and when they do make changes and updates to these rules, they usually inform us through their webmaster central blog. They have updates regarding topics of accessibility, crawling, indexing, and much more.
So, it is essential that you regularly check and stay updated with the Google Webmaster Central Blog.
Website Support & Maintenance
We now know that a lot can go wrong if you neglect your website and not perform routine checks. A well-functioning website can become a powerful tool when it comes to amplifying your business. Therefore our team at ExtraDigital feel that this should be a top priority of any online-based business.
However, we understand that executing a routine check of your website can be quite daunting.
If you require further assistance on how to get started or want to have a better understanding of how website maintenance can help you optimise your website, our website development and management experts are here to help. Or you can find out more about the website maintenance and care plans we offer here.
Give us a call on +44 (0) 1227 68 68 98 to speak to our experts or request a quote by completing the form below.
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