Most people and businesses will, at some point, opt to have their own websites. There are different purposes for building websites. Some core objectives are sharing information, selling a product, carrying out campaigns or email marketing, or providing service. Within the confines of these purposes, a website is core to achieving the intended goals but will need maintenance to increase efficiency and effectiveness.

Website maintenance may take place in phases, on a yearly basis, or upon request. It may involve activities like updating new content, doing away with spam messages, enhancing the website’s security, and monitoring the website traffic. The maintenance of a website is a key to ensuring it is user-friendly and runs efficiently with no noticeable interruptions. Such activity may require a team of web designers, software developers, and security experts.

Website maintenance will enhance the general outlook and experience of the website, traffic and increase sales. This article will define website maintenance, give reasons for the process, the components, costs, the types of maintenance, and tips for managing them.

What is website maintenance?

We can define website maintenance as the process of keeping the designed website to the latest model, ensuring the smooth running of all resources and optimal performance. It includes various tasks like ensuring there are no broken links or links with errors and inappropriate redirects, feeding the website with updated content, setting security add-ons, and removing unnecessary spam messages. You may also do so by backing up the website and monitoring all the visits to the website.

Importance of website maintenance

1. Most customers are conducting their research using online platforms

It is estimated that 87% of people will research online before purchasing something online. If people are considering buying your products or service, there is a likelihood they will visit your website. If your website has a bad impression of who you are as a company, that will give your competitor a higher advantage, and you will miss selling out to the customer.

2. The website will determine your visitor’s first impressions

If your website is outdated or not working efficiently, customers or visitors will likely avoid it or click away. That comes out as a first negative impression of the customers towards your business. An unprofessional website makes visitors think your business is a joke.

3. A website will assist in growing sales

The website is a guiding tool for the visitors to end up making a purchase. You must have a properly functioning eCommerce website to ensure you tap all potential sales.

4. Visitors and customers value their general user experience of the website

If visitors get a bad user experience, a large percentage will end up shopping or going to your competitor. Regular maintenance will ensure an excellent user experience and enhances the chances of potential customers making a purchase.

5. Improving the security of the website

With increased cyberattacks on the rise, if you don’t be careful, you may need to repair damage brought about by such attacks, and it may cost you your customers since they lose trust once their personal information is compromised. Maintain the security protections you have set in place, which will make your customers comfortable making their purchases on the website. Ensure the security systems on your website are always up to date to fight against cyber threats.

6. Website maintenance improves SEO

Keep your website regularly updated to ensure Google ranks it well and users, customers, audiences, or clients visit frequently. If you have a high bounce rate, you rank lower in search results; thus, you get less traffic.

Ensure security issues, technical concerns, design, structure, and content are all in order and updated.

Types of website maintenance

Website maintenance is core to preventing technical issues, improving user experience, and ranking high in search engine results pages (SERPs). It is a tedious process, but very important to ensure the site runs smoothly. Here are the core types to check:

• Security updates: Always ensure your website has security patches that are up to date to protect the site from hackers.
• Plugin & theme updates: The functionality of the website is extended by themes and plugins. Keep them up to date to ensure there are no compatibility concerns with security patches while using the latest web browsers.
• Performance monitoring and optimization: Monitor and optimize the website to improve the responsiveness and speed of the website. Such may include the use of minifying code, optimizing image sizes, and enhancing page load times.
• Content updates: Always update your content, and it should be accurate and relevant. Create new blog posts, remove outdated posts, and update product descriptions. Include the terms of service (TOS) and privacy policy pages on your website.
• Accessibility testing: Do this to ensure your site is accessible to people who experience slow internet speeds, compatible with mobile devices, and accessible to those with disabilities.
• Backup and disaster recovery: Always back up your website depending on the timelines you set, either weekly or daily. Backups prevent data loss and enhance the restoration of compromised attacks or hacking. Disaster recovery will ensure you get back to running smoothly and quickly in case of a hitch.
• Security scanning: Secure the website and protect it from potential threats. Once you scan, it helps you identify and fix any security vulnerabilities.
• User management: You should be ready to create and delete user accounts, reset passwords, and manage different levels of permissions. Having full control ensures you do away with bots and spam accounts.
• SEO monitoring: Your site needs to be visible to the major search engines. Track the ranking of the site, the traffic, and the backlinks.

How much does website maintenance cost?

Website maintenance cost is a relative figure that will always depend on the website type. Some potential website maintenance costs depending on website type, may include:

• A range of $5 to $25 every month for personal websites
• Up to $100 on a monthly basis for SMEs websites
• Ranging from $1500 to even $2500 for eCommerce websites

There are also additional website maintenance costs you will incur. They include:

• Costs for renewing your domain which can be somewhere between $8 to $20 per year.
• Renewing or purchasing a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate. With the SSL in place, your site will have HTTPS in the URL. The costs may range from $10 to $1500 per year.
• Website hosting costs will vary depending on the provider and your package. Shared hosting can range from $24 to $120 on a yearly basis. A virtual private server (VPS) can range from $240 to $600 on a yearly basis, and a dedicated server can cost between $1200 to $24,000 yearly.

Conclusion

We all agree that website maintenance is crucial to enhance your general online business experience and marketing campaigns. Never ignore this process to ensure you have a successful story and a wonderful online presence where customers or visitors maintain loyalty. The website maintenance cost varies depending on several factors like the type of site and the related services like hosting and SSL. You can decide to undertake the website maintenance by yourself or hire an expert web development company to do this. You can always consult a website maintenance expert whenever a problem occurs and ensure it is handled in a timely manner.