Your website is the front door to your business. It is likely the first impression of your brand that people see. It’s important to make sure that users see a healthy, well-maintained site that they can navigate and that gives them the information they seek. If you have broken links, obsolete technology, images that take forever to load, or you are not mobile-friendly then your web site won’t tell the story that you want it to. Here is our checklist to maintain a healthy website:

1. Update your site software. If your website is on a cms platform like WordPress, and it should be, we recommend regular updates of both WordPress and all plugins. Make sure you fully back up your site before you update.
2. Make sure your site is secure. Including:
   1. use complex passwords
   2. implement security to prevent suspicious logins and deny multiple login attempts
   3. keep your software updated (see number 1 above)
   4. verify your site with Google Webmaster Tools. They are very likely to notify you if they suspect a hack.
3. Make sure your site is mobile-friendly. Read our recent article about why this is timely.
4. Check for broken links. Links that do not work will damage search engine optimization and they make your website look neglected. Check all of your navigation, go through each of your pages and click on all of the links. Make sure they work and update them if they do not.
5. Back up your site. We recommend daily back ups.
6. Check that your forms work. Complete all fields, submit the form, and review the submission.
7. Optimize your graphics and your downloads. If the files sizes are too large, the graphic images will take too long to load and the documents will take too long to download
8. Check your site on all browsers. Browser versions are updated often and can become incompatible with older programming. Check your website in the most recent version of all browsers. Do the images load? Do the videos load? Is the navigation broken?  If your site is on the older side, you may need to have some updates made to make your site compatible with the latest version of some browsers.
9. Analyze and review your traffic statistics regularly. You can do this using Google Analytics. It’s simple to install and very easy to use.
10. Update your content regularly. Give your users some new information to keep their interest. This will help with search engine optimization and it will make your company look informed.