You need a great user experience to keep visitors on your website. A reported 90% of visitors will head to a competitor’s website if they don’t enjoy their time on yours. Because of that, you probably invested a lot of time and money in creating a great website design.
But a great design today may not last. As time goes on, your design will become outdated. On top of that, your website can suffer issues that diminish the user experience.
You’ll need the right knowledge to manage a website and keep it online. Keep reading to learn the best tips that will help you learn how to manage a website.
Update Your Software
One of your primary tasks when managing a website is to keep software updated. If you’re like most website owners, you use software to manage your website. And if you self-host, it’s on you to keep things updated.
Your software will regularly get patched to handle website bugs, patch security holds, and introduce new features. Updating to the newest version will help you take advantage of these changes and keep your website running smoothly.
Regularly log into your administrator panel to look for updates. Update all plugins, themes, and core software to ensure things are up to date.
Optimize Your Multimedia
Having a speedy website is essential today. Many people view websites on slower devices since they are always on their phones. If you have a slow website, this means you may lose visitors to your competitors.
One of the biggest reasons a website slows down is the images and other media. Your content team may upload large files without optimizing them, which increases the page size and slows things down. And if you introduce new plugins and design features, you’ll add bloat that reduces page speed.
Audit your images occasionally to ensure they are optimized and load quickly. If you have a lot of plugins, look for ones you don’t use and remove them from your website. Doing this will keep your page size down and your website loading quickly.
Upgrade Your Content
Many website owners use their websites to attract visitors with SEO. They create informative content targeting keywords people search for on Google.
But as time goes on, that information can go out of date. New information will come to light, or something won’t be relevant anymore.
Google wants its visitors to have the most up-to-date information possible. Because of that, you can lose your rankings and traffic if you don’t have updated content. Take time to review your website content, check for accuracy, and update anything needed.
Manage Backup and Security
Security is a big issue for large content management systems. For instance, one WordPress plugin exposed 200,000 websites to a security flaw that wasn’t patched. The software you use can become compromised and lead to problems.
Install security software on your website to help prevent these problems. There are many plugins available, such as WordFence, that will help you lock everything down and deter hackers.
You also have the problem of losing your website. If your software malfunctions, it can lead to lost files and a blank website. Set up a backup system to regularly back up your website files.
Doing this will allow you to quickly restore a website that isn’t working to a working state.
Connect to Social Media
Website management doesn’t mean you only have your website to manage. Many people won’t visit your website on their own. They need a push to come back to see what else you have to offer.
One of the ways website owners do this is by setting up accounts on social media. They create content on their website, convince people to follow their social accounts, and build fan bases there.
Make sure you regularly post new content there and manage engagement on social platforms. Doing this will help you build on both platforms and ultimately build engagement on your website.
Monitor Web Traffic
Another aspect of managing a website is looking at website trends on your analytics. You should have software like Google Analytics that shows how many people visit your website and what they do there.
You can use this information to find your best website pages. These are the pages you want to focus on improving and work on building similar pages that get the same type of visitors.
This also depends on the type of websites you’re working on. For instance, an eCommerce store will likely focus on product pages. A website manager will look to see which products get the most sales and work on improving traffic to those pages and letting stakeholders know which similar products should be in development.
Look for Help
In many cases, you won’t have the time to manage your website. You may have more website ideas for things you can change but lack the resources to make your ideas a reality.
Don’t hesitate to contact a web development company for help. You can sign a retainer with them to manage your website and make updates.
There are also agencies dedicated to specific website platforms. For instance, if you have a WordPress website, you can contact a WordPress agency like https://www.simplior.com/wordpress-website-development/ to get help.
Look for an agency with experience in your specific technology to get the proper help.
How to Manage a Website: Keep Your Site Online
Your job with a website isn’t complete once you get it online. You use software to manage your content, have updates in your business, and need to update the information to provide your visitors with the most relevant information. All of that means you’ll need to understand how to manage a website to keep it updated and working correctly.
But designing a website is a different skill than managing and keeping it running. Now that you’ve read the guide above, you should know where to look to learn more about managing your website well.
