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Five Ideas for "Keeping It Fresh"

April 25, 2007

I read a discussion recently on the StartupNation forums about how to keep your website and marketing content fresh, which ties in nicely with a discussion I had with a client recently about creating a marketing plan and timeline for his company. So to wrap these 2 issues into one jumbo (but abridged) response, I present to you: "How to Keep your Content Fresh".

To start off, I would like to discuss why it is important to keep your site fresh. I read somewhere that comparing "web years" to "calendar years" is a little like comparing "dog years" to "human years". That is, for every 1 year on your calendar, the web leaps through 7 years. Considering this, you can imagine the kinds of problems that stale content can make. For example:

  • Visitors remember your content, and when it doesn’t change, they might assume business is not booming. A booming business has sales, promotions, or seasonal changes. A stale business lists the same out-of-stock items on their site for months.
  • Search engines don’t like stagnated sites. Mr Googlebot is only coming back if you have something new for him to see!
  • Your competition is not resting on being "good enough". If you are, they will eventually pass you by.
  • Not updating your site is a little like still having your Christmas lights up in June - people start to wonder about you. The same goes with site errors, mistakes, or typos that go untouched for a very long time. This also creates an atmosphere where your professionalism is questioned, and this is not good for business. Consumer confidence is what makes sales!

Now that you know why you should keep your site updated and fresh, here are five ideas on how you can go about doing that:

  • Use CSS and new graphics to give your site a facelift.
    To see what CSS can do for your site, check out CSS Zen Garden. This site is essentially the same HTML file, over and over again. What changes is the face of the page, the CSS file. When you design your site using CSS, you can quickly change your graphics to match the season, a sale, or a holiday. It gives the customer the idea that you are offering something new and exciting. Not ready for a full change? Then try …
  • Change a few graphics.
    Google is one of the best examples of this technique - they change their logos for whatever holiday they feel like celebrating. (You can see an archive of their past logos here.) Another example is a client of ours that had a large image on the front of their original web site (made by another developer). We broke it up, using 3 smaller graphics on the left side - 1 of which lists the specials for the week, and the other 2 point to current promotions. These little widgets can be easily swapped with each promotional drive.
  • Update your content.
    If you are happy with your current listing and rank on Google, then keep your keywords and spice up your text. If your listing needs some work, create a keyword list and use that to make some new content. Remember: keywords aside, make sure that your text and descriptions make sense in a normal English context! A high Google ranking will mean nothing if your content isn’t engaging enough to make visitors convert. Take a hard look at your content in this process. When is the last time you did some editing? Has your business direction, product offerings, or marketing plan changed since then? What can you do to make your content more engaging or inviting?
  • Shift the site’s focus through home page and banner changes.
    Use graphics and language on your home page that will direct your traffic to a part of the site they may have not seen or used before. You can use this technique to feature certain products, promote new services, or announce new events. One note: the idea is to pick a few items, not list everything including the kitchen sink. This concept ties in nicely with your marketing plan, as you should decide your traffic and promotional goals well in advance of the actual event.
  • Add new features.
    What are your customers interested in? Would they like to discuss your product with other users? Would they like to know additional ways to use your products? Are they interested in a newsletter with tips involving similar topics? If you don’t know, ask! Most customers would consider it excellent customer service if you were to email them, ask about their results with the product, and ask them what you could have done or added to make the experience better.

I can not stress enough that the first place to start in all of this is your marketing plan. If you need help with this, help is available. Without your marketing plan, which should be written in terms of both what and when, you really are just throwing yourself out there and hoping something accidentally sticks.

I hope this article has given you the inspiration to get that marketing plan going and make some changes in your website. Stay tuned! Our next article will feature some modules that you can use keep your content fresh as well!

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