Summer is the Perfect Time for You to Review Your Website

Summer is typically a slow time for many business services companies. This makes it the perfect time to take an afternoon, sit down with a cold drink, and go through your website to check for any inaccuracies, missing information, or function errors.

If someone visits your website and finds your hours of operation aren’t correct, or they contact a staff member only to find they don’t work there anymore, or they fill out your contact form only to get an error message – your business doesn’t look very professional. These things may sound pretty basic, but we find websites with these blunders all the time!

Checking your website for errors should be a regular practice. Here are our suggestions for the important items to review:

Check Your Hours

Many businesses have reduced (or increased) summer hours, and it’s important to let potential customers know clearly when they can reach you. If you will be closed certain days or weeks due to summer vacations, add that detail as well. The worst thing would be for a customer to need you, find you unopen or only get voicemail, without knowing when you will be available. If you don’t currently have hours of operation on your website, consider adding that as people will look for it.

Are Contacts, Staff Lists, and Bios Correct?

It is very common to add staff members to a website when it is built, then never look at that area again. Make sure your website indicates your current team, and accurate phone numbers and emails. Update bios periodically to reflect everyone’s current experience, position and facts. It’s pretty bad to have a bio that reads, “Jane joined us last year…”, when Jane has worked for you for six years! The last thing you want is for someone to try to get ahold of you, only to find a number unavailable. They will assume you are no longer in business, which is not good!

Test Any Forms

This is probably our #1 issue we see (and fix) on websites. Too often, contact forms, applications, or other submission forms are no longer working. Software updates and other factors can cause a form that once worked fine to now deliver an error message to the person trying to reach out. Also, and this is really important, test all the forms on your website to make sure they are working and delivered to the right email address! If a form is forwarded to an incorrect email, the submitter will never know. They will just wonder why you don’t take the time to respond to them.

Evaluate Your Digital Footprint

Summer is the perfect time to level up your business – particularly your digital footprint. Your website is the foundation of this important effort! If people go directly to your site, all your changes will show immediately, but search engines take 30-60 days to index pages on a website. This means changes and updates you make today may not show up in a search for over a month. With summer being quieter for many businesses, you can make your necessary updates, and have some time for them to be fully integrated into the internet for the busy fall business season.

Don’t get caught looking sloppy, unavailable, or, worse, out of business!
Take some time to review your website this summer.

Zebralove Web Solutions is here to help!

At Zebralove Web Solutions, we are available to help with any website updates you many have. Additionally, we offer hourly consulting services

Noelle Castle

Content Writer

Castle Media Co.

Noelle has been a marketing professional, and a published author and copywriter for over 20 years. Her work has been featured in both print publications and online media, where she has written on a broad range of topics. She owns Castle Media Co., assisting businesses with their marketing and digital media needs, specializing in website development, content marketing, social media, copywriting, and blogging.

Contact Author