Pack your bags: 5 Tips to move your small business website into the new year

Pack your bags, my friends. With only 2 weeks until the New Year, small business owners need to take their final steps to organize and move their small business website into the new year. End your year strong with these 5 tips to help move your website into 2016 (without the baggage fees and TSA searches):

1. Put everything on-the-books – Add your finance updates, CRM (customer relationship management) updates or add those new potential clients to your email distribution lists – everything needs to be updated and current going into the new year. It’s nothing like starting a fresh new year with old baggage to weigh you down and prevent you from starting fresh.
2. Fix what you broke – It may not sound exciting but, in the downtime around the holidays (you know, when your uncle can’t stop talking in detail about his knee surgery), that’s the best time to tinker with the things that are not working on your website.
   • Do you need to fix a picture that is no longer showing or replace it with a higher quality one?
   • Do you have some 404: Page not found errors that need to be rerouted to new links?
   • Does your link to your calendar pull up March instead of the whole year’s view?

3. Find what worked and what didn’t – As you are going into your website, fixing broken links and making sure everything is in tiptop shape, you may want to update and check your analytics to see what worked and what didn’t. Are their pages that are getting loads of traffic and others that are getting no time at all? What is your conversion rate? Where are they coming from when they vision your site? Are they on computers or mobile devices?

  If you are not already doing research and viewing your analytics, start now over the holidays to familiarize yourself with the reports and what they mean.

4. Set your goals for next year – Your website goals should complement your business goals. What do you want to do – increase sales? Gain new customers? Show new products and services? Think about how your website should help you accomplish those goals. Then, review your website to see if changes need to be made to help you.

• Does your content need to change from targeting new customers to keeping current customers?
• Do you need more pictures and graphics to represent new product lines or services you will have this year?
• Are you investing more in marketing and promotions where you need a new section for “Sale of the month”

   Make your tools work for you in the way you need them to work. This requires a regular review and alignment to your goals –  think of it as an employee evaluation. You wouldn’t let your employees go to long without promoting what you need them to. Why would you let your website do this?

5. Set your marketing budget – Now that you know what is on the books, what is broken that you can’t fix, what worked and didn’t and what direction you need to go in for the coming year, you need to determine how much money you need to get that work done.

Aligning your marketing budget with your business budget will help you determine what you can and can not do this year. If you can’t get everything done, then prioritize based on business impact and expense, then add items if more money becomes available.

Talking it out with a trusted professional can help you determine new trends in marketing or key website changes that you may need account for in your budget.

If you need help or want a bid from Type 3 Web Design, Michael is more than happy to help you – just email him at [email protected] or call us at 1-479-274-8369.

Otherwise, depending upon what work needs to get done, you can find service providers in Northwest Arkansas or beyond to get you pictures or refresh your content or help you determine what you need and how much it could cost you.

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