7 Tips to Spiff Up Your Website for the New Year

[Photo Flickr Anindya Baruah]

Your website is kinda like a dog. You tell it to “Sit. Stay.” and it pretty much does.

Your dog needs spiffing up every now and then, and so does your website, so here are some quick tips to clean it up for the New Year.

1. Check your links. As you add content and pages throughout the year it’s easy to make little typos that cause the dreaded “page not found.” Visit the W3C Link Validator service to have a look see.
2. Do a browser check. Visit the Google Labs Browsersize tool to see how much of your website shows in various size browsers. You can also see how your site renders in various browser by using a tool like Browser Shots.
3. Mobilize your site. There are over 56 million people with handhelds. Look into a mobile version of your website by adding a mobile plugin such as Alex King’s Wordpress Mobile, or using a paid service like MoFuse or Mobify. [*this is on my to-do list]
4. Do the grandma test. Read every page of your site from top to bottom. Check for complete sentences, typos, etc. As you are reading, try to picture your grandmother (better, your ideal client). If your grandmother can understand it (and your prospect “gets” it),  you’re ahead of 95% of all websites.
5. Voice check. Does your website sound like you? And is it written in the same voice from page to page (i.e. first person, second person). And is it customer focused or all about you? Check out the “We-We Calculator” here.
6. Benchmark it. Check the top 3 keyword phrases in Google Analytics for which your site is being found. Are these the top three for which you intended to be ranked? If so, type each phrase into the Google search box and make a note of your site position for that phrase. This becomes your benchmark for making improvements throughout the year. If the top three phrases are not what you want, hmmmm, well that’s a post for another day.
7. Choose a core action. Every page of your website should reflect your core message which should lead to the action you want your reader to take. That might be joining your email ist, subscribing to your RSS feed, requesting a strategy session, or something else. Remember people are not always going to enter your stie from the home page. Is your core action easy and aparent on every page of your site?

That’s all I can think of for now but I am sure I have overlooked some important things. What are they? I look forward to your comments.