Upgrading Your Current Online Store

If you answer “yes” to any of the following questions, you need to update your website, pronto.

Does your web page contain scrolling, blinking text or images?
Does your homepageinclude an outdated copyright date in the footer that screams, I haven’t thought about my website since 2011?
Do you have Flash anywhere on your website, or a ‘click to enter site’ homepage?
Does your site have more than 3 different font styles, sizes and colours?
Do you use Clipart images on your site?
Do you have an annoying music track or video that automatically starts playing?
Do you have outdated content and broken links?
Are you missing important meta tags and keywords?

Why You Need to Upgrade Regularly

The problem with a slow website is that if your homepage isn’t fully loaded for your visitors in less than6 seconds, you’ve most likely lost them, as they will go look elsewhere.

Your website must:

Continually evolve and be refined to meet the increasing demands of your audience or client base.
Reflect the progressing technologies and new browser versions.
Have fresh material added regularly to keep visitors coming back to see what’s new.
Routinely feature creative new content, text, graphics or images, to build the traffic of repeat visitors.

What You Can Do Right Now

It is usefulto add a search tool, such as pay-per-click, automated forms, a mailing list database, or other interactive functions.

Pay-per-click is an effectiveonline advertising format that allows you to buy your way to the top of search results pages. This tactical form of advertising permits you to choose keywords or phrases you would like your site to be associated with when a search is performed.

You may discover new and better ways to organise your information or improve the usability of your site. You might also come up with more features to add that do nothing more than help provide some benefit to your visitors, which is a sure-fire way to build a rapport with future clients or customers.

The success of your website is largely dependent on whether people can find your site from a search engine or link index. Directories are constantly changing the way they rank and display sites, and some search engines will not index your site at all unless your pages contain appropriate meta tags, well-structured content, or error-free HTMLcodes. This all requires ongoing supervision and interaction to assure that your site remains listed properly.

You will want to make sure your host server is always doing what it’s supposed to, that your files and file directory structures remain intact, and that all your links are still functional. You should also review a regular report of site statistics, to see how much traffic you are getting and where it’s coming from, in order to evaluate the overall effectiveness of your website. Anyone who relies on their site for business purposes should have it monitored daily.

Stand Out from the Crowd

To stand out from the crowd, you should consider:

Unified communications (UC)technology– The ability to move seamlessly among multiple communications devices (the business phone system, instant messaging, email, web conferencing, and videochat) can be a huge asset in effective communication. Businesses can use UC technology to resolve a complaint, explain a solution, sell a product, and much more.
Video content – This is currently one of the fastest growing sectors on the Internet. If you want to help your visitors and customers make the most of your products, or help them to choose the right model, then why not add videos to your website? You might want your visitors to upload their own videos to your site too.

There should always be a constant, technical supervision of your site, to keep it running smoothly. Just like in all other aspects of life’s journey, the cyber highway also has its potholes and road hazards.