When you're considering a revamp of your small business website, timing is a very important factor. You want your website to stimulate business effectively, but if your business has any seasonal characteristics, choosing the right time to do a major update is crucial. Your new content needs visitors to read it at a time when they're considering making a purchase or using your services.
For example, a heating and air conditioning business, like the ones listed in the work samples on the left sidebar, has two distinct seasons. Its customers typically start thinking about investing in new furnaces or air conditioners shortly before the season arrives when they will be needed. They're not looking for those products at other times during the year.
The most important issue for scheduling website updates is to have that fresh content and new sales strategies in front of visitors when they are actively looking for your products or services. Since website changes take some to implement and additional time to propagate through the search engine algorithms, getting your website as high in search engine results as possible just as your selling season begins is very important. Here are some suggestions to help that happen:
- Plan Website Changes at Least 6 Months in Advance - A typical website revamp, with fresh content, design changes, and other new features generally takes two or three months to complete, depending on your web designer and content provider. Having your new website at its best position in search engine results means giving your SEO strategies time to work. Six months is a good basic lead time for maximum productivity during your selling season.
- Don't Lose Ground with Changes - While fresh new content and design features can help boost sales, it's important not to lose search engine results gains from the past. Use site metrics analysis to identify strong and weak SEO strategies on your current website, and retain everything that is working. Focus on implementing new SEO strategies where your current website has weaknesses.
- Replace Outdated Content with Fresh Content - Carefully examine your current website and identify any content that is no longer current or is flawed in other ways. A website revamp should always aim at providing new content for visitors to see, while updating and improving existing content.
- Create Unity on Your Updated Website - Too many small business websites show the results of having a history of different content providers. That can confuse visitors and interfere with your sales strategies. While you're revamping the site, have your content provider refresh old material to make the entire site consistent in voice and strategy.
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