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I recently gave a new presentation at The Special Event Show (TSE) in Nashville titled “5 Signs It’s Time To Fire Your Website“. It’s the sequel, if you will, to my book “If your website was an employee, would you fire it?“. As a consultant, website reviews are one of my most requested services, and I don’t really want to tell you that it’s time to make a new site. I know that it involves stress, time, money and aggravation… and who needs more of that?
When it’s time, it’s time
However, there comes a time for every site when it’s time. For most of us, that time comes sooner than we’d like. I recently launched my new site after 2 1/2 years with the old one. Now, that may not seem like a long time for the old site, but there were some things that made me know it was time. Those things, at least for me, weren’t that it was outdated or non-functional. Rather, for me the signs were that my old site wasn’t designed for e-commerce. When I first launched it, in March 2011, I only had one book. As I developed more products, DVDs, Audio CDs, ebooks, Spanish-language books and MP3s, it became clear that I was outgrowing the architecture of the site. All products were on one, long (and getting longer) page. I wouldn’t want to keep scrolling down, down, down to get to the other products, so I knew none of you would either.
That was the first sign
The next was that more of you were visiting my site via mobile devices. As of this writing 24% of my new site’s traffic is through mobile. 73% of that traffic is specifically through iPads and iPhones. While I only had one Flash element on my old site (two video testimonials), those are not visible on Apple phones and tablets. I know that percentage is only going to grow, so it was time to act.
Should I stay or should I go?
So, when is it time to call it day on your current site? For most of you the clock is either ticking, or the time has already passed. You can’t make a new site in a day… at least not a good one. You should start planning at least 6 months in advance. In my presentation at TSE I gave my 5 Signs It’s Time To Fire Your Website. I’m going to list them here, along with a couple of bonuses.
- You made your website yourself… and it looks like it. I don’t care if you make it yourself. It just shouldn’t look like you did.
- The design is obviously outdated (narrow, dark, frames and borders on everything). If it’s more than 3 years old, it’s probably getting dated, every day.
- Your website doesn’t match your current branding. When you update one part of your branding, you have to update them all.
- It’s not mobile-friendly. See above and find out how much of your traffic is coming through mobile devices. In the presentation I go into detail about two different mobile strategies.
- You’re getting traffic, but not inquiries. Conversion of the traffic you’re already getting is key to improving your current, or a new site.
Two Bonuses: - If there’s only one person, or company, that can manage your site, you need to think about what would happen if they went away. Your site is too important to have only one person, or company that knows how to manage or maintain it. If you don’t have access to the coding, backend and hosting, that’s a problem waiting to happen.
- If your current site is costing you more in lost business, than a new site would cost to make… then you’re losing money every day.
In my presentation I also highlighted 5 Ways to Retrain Your Current Site to perform better, 6 Things You Should Remove from your current site and 6 Things You Should Add to your current site. If you’d like to hear the entire presentation, the MP3 audio is in my shop, on sale for the next couple of weeks only. Click here to hear it, as well as many other actionable presentations on MP3 Audio, DVD, book and CD.
If you’re like the people who attended, you’ll be making quick and easy changes to your current site, right away… whether or not you’re working on a new site. And don’t worry, any updates you make to your current site will only help you when you decide to move on to a new site.
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If you have any questions about this, or any of my presentations, please contact me. If you’d like to have me personally review your website with you, check out my website review services and then contact me or call 732.422.6362. International enquiries ring 001 732 422 6362
If you’d like to have me present this, or other topics at your company, meeting, group or conference, please email me or call 732.422.6362. International enquiries ring 001 732 422 6362