My website is too costly!

Whether or not this thought regularly crosses your mind, this article is for you!

If you experience these sorts of concerns, it can still indicate that your site has been properly designed and maintained. Alternately, your site may have conceptual faults (such as having been created without a strategic vision and/or by a pseudo-expert) and a major overhaul and upgrade is necessary to make the website worth the investment. On the other hand, however, if you have never wondered about the costs related to your website, ask yourself whether you are really getting back what you expect from it.

Many companies, especially in B2B sector, believe that having a website implies a fixed cost (one that corresponds only to its initial creation and launch). They mistakenly ignore the maintenance costs that are part of operating a viable company website.

Here are a few ideas to help you judge the importance of maintaining your company’s site:

• Updating site content:

Special promotional activities, important company communications, and changes taking place in your industry are all things that may necessitate creating supplemental pages or modifying some of the existing content on your site.

The appearance of new industry terminology and emerging trends can also justify adapting your SEO keywords to guarantee your site’s continued visibility.

• Updating website structure:

A change in how your company positions itself, an evolving structure of your service offer, the launch of a company blog, the addition of a particular application, or an unexpectedly low number of visits to one area of your site are all elements that demand a review of how the site’s structure is organized.

• Updating your site’s layout and design:

A modification of your company logo, changes to your graphic charter or corporate brand book, or even a change to your company’s name are all reasons to reconsider the visual presentation of your site.

Updating a site’s content can also justify revisting its design. Other developments such as starting a company blog, the addition of an online catalog, or the launch of a particular online application are all good reasons to revisit the way elements are arranged on the site in order to optimize its navigability and visual appeal.

Keep in mind that your company, and its strategic vision, is not static. It is constantly evolving, so your website should continue to evolve as well. It’s wise to take into account that internet technology is also constantly evolving, so a site that remains unchanged over the long-term will not remain at the same level.

Of course there are ways to optimize the cost of maintaining a corporate website. For example, if you tend to update your site’s content pretty frequently, it may be wise to work with a CMS. This could be a subject for a future blog post.

As a general rule, we suggest a site redesign is justified every two years to ensure regular updates remain aligned. Make no mistake – a properly maintained corporate website is a vital investment in your business. Don’t underestimate the value of that investment.