It’s a question we’re frequently asked by clients; “How often do I need to update my website?”

While there’s no definitive answer – because every business is unique – as a general rule, we recommend that a website should have fresh content added to it at least once a month. If you can manage updates more often than this, even better.

Why does making time to add new content to your site matter?

In short, because refreshing your website regularly will have a direct impact on your business.

Here are 3 reasons why it’s so important:

1. It boosts your SEO

One of the factors Google uses to determine where to rank a website is how up to date content is. The search engine wants to direct users to websites that will deliver the most current information, and it will always give priority to sites it can see are being regularly refreshed.

If you’ve not updated content for a while, you’re likely to find yourself relegated below competitors with more recently updated sites, because Google will assume their content is more relevant than yours. A lower position will make it more difficult for your business to be found, and in the worst-case scenario, you could find you are losing enquiries to higher ranked competitors who have more up to date sites.

2. It makes the right first impression

Your website is likely to be the first point of contact prospective customers have with your business, and first impressions really do count. What will a new visitor think if you’ve not posted a blog for months, social media feeds lead to dead-ends, or your most recent testimonial is over a year old? At best, they’ll conclude you’re unprofessional; at worst, that you’re out of business.

Adding new content regularly demonstrates that your business is very much alive. It also reassures current customers they’re dealing with a business that cares about keeping up to date, and encourages them to return frequently for new information.

3. It can give you valuable marketing insights

Using a web analysis tool like Google Analytics, you’ll see which updates get the results you want, enabling you to refine content and optimise your site’s effectiveness.

How Fresh is Your Website?

Reviewing and refreshing your website is good practise and should be a regular part of your marketing activity. Areas to consider include:

• Products and services – do they accurately represent your current offering?
• Key marketing messages and USPs – are they still relevant?
• Testimonials and case studies – these need to be continually replaced to reference your latest work. You might want to consider not dating case studies to help extend their ‘shelf-life’.
• Social media feeds – ensure any social media feeds on your site are active – or remove them completely to avoid giving the wrong impression.
• Staff profiles – people come and go, are your team details up to date? Omitting to remove leavers looks bad, but new joiners present an opportunity for fresh content.

Creating fresh content doesn’t have to be onerous. It can be as simple as reworking your welcome message, adding a new product or service, a tip or resource, an FAQ or special offer, or uploading a new image with a caption.

Finally, if you don’t have one already, a blog is a great way to keep your site updated, attract new visitors and position your business as the ‘go to’ expert in your field. You’ll need to be disciplined to write regular posts (or you could outsource this task), but as well as ensuring you keep things fresh, you’ll be creating a raft of valuable content you can re-purpose in other media. If your blogging is a little erratic, you could remove dates from your posts to make it less obvious, and remember that you can always go back to blogs you wrote a while ago – updating them is effectively creating brand new content.

If you’d like any help or advice on keeping your website up to date, get in touch now by sending us a message or calling us on 0118 380 0131 for a chat.