Why Should I Maintain/Update My Web-Site?
Search Engine Optimisation
There are four main problems to selling an item from a web-site. These are getting someone to:
- Find the web-site.
- Enter the web-site.
- Make an initial purchase
- Become a repeat customer
Of all of these the most difficult, costly and time consuming is getting someone to actually find your web-site. Primarily because there are literally millions of web-sites currently on-line, and probably thousands (or tens of thousands) doing/selling the same thing you are. If you do not believe me then use a search engine (
google,
dogpile,
yahoo etc.) to do a quick search and see how many pages of hits you get for web-sites similar to yours.
Even if your web-site manages to be at the top of a search list it probably won't not stay there for long. This is because:
- there are always new web-sites being added every day, and
- web-sites lower on search engine rankings keep updating their web-sites to work their way to the top.
- search engines constantly refine and update the way they search for and rank web-sites.
This means that unless you keep updating/improving your web-site may be push out of the top 30 hits. Since most people do not check sites below the first 30 hits the chances of people visiting your web-site decrease dramatically once you fall out of the top 30 hits.
Comparison Shopping
Once some has actually entered your web-site your chances of actually making a sale (even if the item is not what the person initially wanted) increases dramatically. Once an initial purchase has been made the probability repeat sales in the future dramatically increases. This is especially so if the whole purchase experience was informative, pleasant, simple and fast.
This does not stop the person comparing one web-site to another looking for:
- quality products.
- a better service
- an increased product range
- a cheaper price
If you place your web-site on the internet and never change anything never change anything then do not expect to many repeat customers. They will simply get what they want and then go elsewhere. For this reason it is generally better if you keep looking around for ways to improve the above qualities in your web-site. This will keep people interested and coming back to your web-site.
How much will it cost to maintain my web-site?
My fees are $40 per new page or $40 per hour (whichever is the greater). This includes making the changes and uploading the changes to the internet.
