When was the last time you did a website health check?
We all know that our website is one of our business’s most important assets: it’s where we showcase our products and services, it’s how we connect with customers and prospects, and it’s the foundation of our online presence.
Yet, many businesses overlook maintenance because they are unaware of how to do it. Luckily, with the help of some online tools, maintaining strong online health is as easy as ever.
A strong business website is critical for developing your company’s digital footprint and brand awareness. As a result, conducting a full inspection must be part of your company’s monthly review.
That said, check out these 6 tools to help you diagnose any potential problems!
1. Website Page Speed
Your search engine rankings are directly affected by the speed of your website’s page load. Websites that load more quickly are typically ranked higher.
A better user experience is provided by websites that load faster. Visitors aren’t prepared to wait long for your site to load on their phones, so they’ll leave if it takes too long.
In fact, a high bounce rate is a significant indicator that the page isn’t working as intended. According to Google, one-third of site visitors will leave if it takes more than 3 seconds for the page to load, which will be reflected in a high bounce rate.
Google’s PageSpeed Insights is a powerful tool for measuring the page loading speed of your website on both desktop and mobile devices.
It’s one of the most stringent means of assessing site speed, so don’t get concerned if you see a low score at first, even Amazon.com only received a 51 on desktop.
2. Broken Links
Broken links on your website can harm your site’s search engine rankings and irritate visitors.
These kinds of unpleasant experiences with your website may have long-term consequences.
Even if you cure your site, it’s possible that you’ve lost too many visitors to recover. After a negative user experience, customers may not return to a website.
So, make sure all of your links are in working order by using free online tools like brokenlinkcheck.com to do monthly link inspections.
Finally, make sure that all of your external links open in a new window. Opening external links in the same window sends visitors away from your site and reduces the length of their stay.
3. Image file size
If you upload an image with too large of file size, it will take longer to load and display on your website.
This means that people won’t see your post or page as quickly as they would if the image was smaller.
It also means that your post will take up more space on the web server, which could cause issues with other posts loading at the same time.
One of the easiest ways to optimize your website images is to use a free online service called TinyPNG.
TinyPNG allows you to resize any image without losing quality. You can then save the new version of the image to your computer and upload to your website.
4. Mobile Responsiveness
Who isn’t irritated by bad mobile optimisation?
The significance of mobile responsive website design is evident in search engine indexing.
In fact, Google now ranks a mobile version of your website over your desktop version. So it pays to get it right.
Test your website for mobile optimisation using Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test.
Simply enter your URL and get a picture of how Google sees the page on a mobile device as well as a list of any mobile usability issues it finds.
5. Web Accessibility
Web accessibility has grown in importance as it allows people with impairments to access the internet on an equal playing field. Keyboard and screen reader-friendly sites allow visitors to effortlessly browse your website.
The World Wide Web Consortium has a list of testing tools that it recommends for evaluating the accessibility of your website. Some of these fixes may need to be done by a web developer, but some can be done through your CMS such as:
- Using high contrast colours
- Choosing an easy-to-read font
- Writing headers for your content and following the correct header order (h2, h3, h4 etc.)
- Adding alt-text to your images
- Offering media alternatives for videos such as captions or a transcript
- Adding an accessibility widget to your website
6. UX Design
If you’ve done the other site checks and it STILL isn’t meeting your goals, it’s time for a redesign.
UX design is the creation of technologies (digital or physical) that are useful, simple to operate, and pleasurable to interact with. In a nutshell, it emphasises the user experience in your product’s design.
While Google Analytics may give you some information on how your site’s visitors use it, a UX website analysis tool like Crazy Egg or Hotjar can provide you with a deeper look.
Heat mapping is used in these programs to detect how people engage with your website and identify areas that are not used.
When you know what people aren’t clicking on, you can employ a web design agency to create a more engaging user interface (UI) and remove areas that aren’t being utilised.
Finishing Words
There’s no doubt that optimising your site for both users and search engines is in your company’s best interests.
Technical blunders on your website may turn away people and discourage them from coming back, resulting in a loss of revenue.
You’ll be able to discover and correct these problems quickly by incorporating the above website maintenance tools and tips into your monthly website health checkup.
NEXT – Check out my article on website speed to help further get your site shipshape.
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