5 Things you need to know about the cost of not doing Website Maitntenance

Regular website maintenance is non-negotiable and should be an ongoing affair. Over and above adding new pages, your website maintenance should also link to the performance of your website; it’s imperative that you continuously maintain your site to ensure it’s performing at its optimum.

The infographic below was created by Smartbear, a company that specialises in software testing. The infographic shows how small things like enhancing the page load speed can improve the revenue you can generate from your website.

1. Site loading speed is paramount
Do you know how long your site takes to load? You may have initially factored in loading times when your website was first designed, but through your regular website maintenance you could have changed something that adversely affects your loading speed, a huge factor in loss of visitors.

Factors that influence the speed of your site include: your server, content on your site and widgets used on your site that are hosted by a third party. A massive 57% of people will leave a site within the first three seconds if the site is perceived to be too slow. Shockingly, most major retail sites take ten or more seconds to load – a whole seven seconds too long.

2. One second is a long time

Let’s look at what a mere one second added to your loading time will do:

• 11% fewer page views
• 16% decrease in customer satisfaction
• 7% loss in conversion

  In monetary terms, if you use Amazon as an example, a one second decrease would result in the loss of $1.6 billion annually. If you want to make sure you aren’t losing revenue due to slow page loading time, regular website maintenance based on page speed optimisation cannot be ignored.

  3. More money is moving online
  The research company Forrester recently predicted that by 2016, 9% off all global retail sales will be conducted online. Retailers spend a huge amount of money optimising the flow of their stores in malls, increasingly though if you want to secure business through your online engagement with customers, regular website maintenance is the first step in making their user experience as enjoyable as possible.

  4. Don’t ignore your conversion forms
  Most people are familiar with the generic HTML contact form employed on numerous websites. These forms fulfil the important task of letting your audience make contact, enquire about your product or services or request a quote. While these forms are useful, they’re often also a source of irritation and therefore loss of revenue. These are the most common things that’ll put people off using your HTML contact form.

  Too many fields: Make filling in the form as quick and easy as possible by minimising the number of required fields.

  Form validation is too strict: Don’t make people jump through hoops in order to make contact. Again, simplicity and ease of use is key.

  The much hated re-typing of some obscure word or phrase: Find another way to ward off spam – this is probably one of the most annoying things encountered on the web today.

  Making someone re-type information: Don’t put people off by making this a laborious task. If they’ve already entered certain information such as their address or shirt size, have a system in place that’ll automatically repeat it when necessary.

  Regularly analysing and maintaining all of the forms on your site will keep your user’s experience pleasant. This goes a long way towards converting them into clients. Remember that these forms are the lifeline of your online business. The cost of not maintaining your online forms is potentially massive – even more so than your loading speed.

  Website maintenance impacts your communication
  A large portion of your communication will entail the building of landing pages for specific campaigns, competitions or a destination they’re directed to upon replying to one of your emails. If you don’t have a marketing automation system or an easy-to-use content management system (CMS) to do this for you, you’ll have to go through the costly exercise of hiring a designer and programmer every single time you need a new page.

  An automated marketing system will not only allow you to easily to maintain your website but should also do things such as automatically personalising each email you send, or personalising a website based on an individual’s preference
  By Gareth Slaven