Have you been thinking that it’s time to improve your website?
It’s been years since you did anything with your business website. The About information is out of date and the last blog post is dated 2018. Perhaps you have some products that you should add, but you never seem to have any time. The website needs a good makeover, or at least to take part in a TV show where you will get several areas made over in 60 minutes by Laurence Llewelyn Bowen.
Your website is an important tool that will help your business if you keep it updated. The first thing that you should do, is to put aside some time to work on it. There are several areas to look at which should help it improve:
Theme
Images
Feature Image
SEO
Navigation of the website
Information about your business
Blog Content
Links to social media – making content easy to share
Improve Your Website Theme
The theme is the first big decision. You may have had your theme for a very long time and it is starting to date. Keeping your theme up-to-date is important for security, If you use a WordPress blog, then changing your theme is easy. You can browse the themes and just pick one. Each theme has an option to preview. This means that you can see how your website would look before making the move.
You can also buy a custom theme from a developer for WordPress, although you may need some support to make the website work as you want. Most of the themes are able to use custom colours and you can add your own banners. Make sure that you have saved your website to back up before changing the theme.
Which Theme?
When looking for a new theme, I take into account the ratio of content to images, the blocks available to add badges or other things linked to my work. I also look for navigation of the website and how easy it is to locate the important pages and the ability to add social media. The theme should look clean and work well with any plugins. It should also support mobile devices.
The current trend is for image-heavy themes, but I prefer more space for content as I am a writer. My current theme is 2015 for WordPress. I have used it for over a year and I like how it looks and it is easy to set up to my specifications. I do keep an eye on new themes and I will change if I find I like a theme better, or if my theme stops being supported. So choose a theme that works for you and your business and helps to improve your brand.
Images
Using the right images help to improve your website. How you find your images depends on your budget. There are a number of free websites out there that will enable you to find topical images to suit your subject. If you are writing about a generic topic, then you will usually manage to find an image using a free website. Examples include Pixabay, Unsplash and Pexels. Many will allow you to donate the price of a cup of coffee in order to help support the website. You are also sometimes asked to attribute the image. Make sure you read the terms of use and follow them.
Some businesses take out a monthly subscription to one of the big image websites such as iStockPhoto. This can give you access to a huge amount of images, including graphics, on any subject you can imagine. I have previously used this method and it is important to choose your image carefully. Look for ones that seem natural rather than posed and make sure that the detail that you want is positioned correctly in the image. Some websites use small photos and you need to ensure that the image can be seen.
Feature Image
Do use the ‘Feature Image’ if available. This will put a thumbnail blog post image to represent the blog post. This is a feature of WordPress, which can be found on the right hand side page of the post in edit mode. The button tells you to “Set Feature Image” and gives you instructions to do so. I would always use the image that I have chosen to illustrate the blog post.
SEO
There are some great plug-ins to help you improve the search engine optimisation (SEO) of your website. I use Yoast. There is both a free and a premium version. Yoast combines the ability to adjust your SEO to help your website, with links to great information that explains why you are asked to take these steps. It gives you pointers on readability, passive voice and length of sentences. It also enables you to edit the snippet that can be seen if your blog post comes up in a search. It enables you to think about SEO while you are editing the post and this can help your website move higher in the search results. I can disagree with Yoast, but at least I know that if I am ignoring its advice, that I may be limiting my search engine ranking. The advice it gives is sound.
Yoast can cause a problem if you are running Google XML sitemaps. I found this blog by Winning WP which explains the problem clearly and what to do about it.
Easy Navigation to Improve Your Website
How the users navigate your website is key.
Can they find your ‘About’ page?
Can they find out how to contact you?
Do you need a landing page to sell a new product?
Or are you selling a service and you need to highlight the skills you offer?
Answer these questions and set up your website to highlight these services and your website will really be improved.
Readability on a Mobile Device
Can users navigate your website on a mobile device? It is good practice to check out how your website looks on a mobile device and how easy it is to navigate. You may change the navigation of your website according to offers you are promoting, or if you have a new product coming out that you wish to promote.
Think through where visitors land when they visit your website. Is it clear where they go for offers? For your blog, news or events? To learn more about your company? If it is not obvious where to go for this information, then change your website so that it is more user-friendly. Your theme should enable you to make this kind of change without too much technical knowledge.
Tip: Ask a friend to go on your website and see what they think about the navigation of it. A fresh pair of eyes can help you find where improvements to your website are needed.
Information about your Business
Is your website getting your message across? Can visitors to your website understand what your business does? Does your website enable visitors to do what they want to do?
Customers want to know about the company they are dealing with. The information about your business should be up-to-date. It should be clear to website visitors what the business does. Include a short statement that explicitly explains what you do and what actions potential customers can take to contact you. Make it easy for them to contact you – include phone number and email if needed.
Blog Content
Writing a blog for your business is one of the best ways to improve your website. Regularly adding content can help your position in the search engines. Blog posts can be short and pithy or they can be long useful content. You can write a mix of evergreen content or content which does not date. You can also write news-type content where it is only relevant for a short space of time. Your blog should reflect your business and written for your audience. It is important that it contains subjects of interest and useful information. Blog posts can also contain a call to action that encourages the reader to respond in some way.
Thinking up subjects for blog posts can be hard at first, but the more you do it, the better you get. You can include interviews, news, events, how to posts and more. It is best to post a regular blog, but how regularly is up to you. You can also ask people to post guest blogs if they are of particular interest.
Check out this retro post from 2016 on 30 Ways to Find Blog Post Ideas
Links to Social Media
If you use social media to promote your business, then do include it on your website. Only include social media where your company is active. There’s nothing worse than a potential customer clicking on a link and the last post was 2017. If your company is active then retweeting blog post links can help bring potential customers to your website, increasing traffic.
Be careful and do have someone monitor your social media regularly. Often customers can use it as a place to get your attention and complain. If you get a complaint on social media, it is not necessarily a blot on your company. However you will want to pick up on it quickly and resolve it.
Have you improved your website recently? Which elements did you take note of? How important is it that your website gets your message across?
