7 Tips to Spring Clean your Website
Is your website looking a little tired and overgrown? Maybe it’s time for a spring clean!
Just like your house, your website can benefit from a once-a-year deep clean to clear out the clutter and freshen it up. Yes, it takes a bit of time but think how much nicer it is to hang out in a tidy house.
Similarly, a spring cleaning will make your website feel more welcoming to visitors, encouraging them to stay longer and explore more.
So where to begin? I suggest you start with some technical things before moving on to content.
1. Check for broken links and slow pages.
We talked about both of these points in the basic maintenance section of our Site Launched. Now What? blog post but it’s worth going over it again.
A broken link is a web page that can’t be found or assessed by a user. It can happen for several reasons - a person might have entered the wrong URL, the web manager might have added an incorrect link or the page might have moved or been removed.
Broken links are frustrating for users for obvious reasons and they result in higher bounce rates that can impact your site ranking.
There are lots of free online tools to help you identify broken links. We recommend Broken Link Check and Dead Link Checker.
Like broken links, slow loading pages can frustrate your visitors and hurt your ranking. Page Speed Online, Pingdom and GTmetrix can help you test your site for speed and find potential errors.
Better yet, sites like Page Speed can not only help identify the problems but can also suggest ways to improve your pages - from optimising the size of images to removing unused code and reducing redirects.
2. Clear out the clutter
Too many images, too many fonts and too much text can make a website feel cluttered. Add to that willy nilly content placement and poor site organisation and the sense of disarray is complete.
I am more of a minimalist and like lots of white space to allow the text and the images on a site to breathe. And I am not the only one - research shows that 94% of website users’ first impressions are design-related, 75% of users admit to making judgements about a company’s credibility based on their website design and 38% of visitors will stop engaging with a website if the content or layout is unattractive.
Unfortunately, clutter can slowly sneak into websites without us noticing especially if we continue to add new elements without clearing out the old and unused items.
What to do about clutter? Remind yourself of what you want visitors to think and feel and do when they land on your page. Then go through each item on your site and ask ‘Does this add value to the user experience? and Does it contribute to my website business goals?
If YES, keep and better yet see if it can be improved.
If NO, either remove it completely or move it to another page - for example, maybe your delivery policy doesn’t need to be on your home page and could go on an FAQ page.
Now that you’ve cleared out some of the clutter and refocused the content on your customer goals, check for scannability. A scannable site makes the most important and relevant information on your site easy to find.
For me it is often about the text - and when I say text I mostly mean the headlines. I want headlines that speak to me about why I am on the site and really resonate. I don’t want bland marketing speak that maybe sounds good but means nothing.
Then I want the captivating images that reinforce the text - and together tell a cohesive, compelling and engaging story.
Here are some tips for making your site scannable
Write in short blocks with strong headlines that make it easy to scan.
Create a visual hierarchy so people can understand what’s most important.
Use lots of white space to create a sense of calm and allow visitors to focus on key elements.
Support the text with images and videos that bring the words to life.
Add a persuasive Calls To Action* that speaks to the person directly, is relevant and motivational.
*Need a refresher on CTAs - see our blog post What you need to know about CTAs.
Finally, double-check your navigation.
Is there any litter blocking the path? You want to make sure that your website navigation is descriptive and self-explanatory.
Labels like ‘products’ and ‘services’ are commonly used but also generic so think if there is a better description, bonus points if it includes a keyword.
Too many options are another problem. Best practice recommends 5 and no more than 7 menu items on a homepage.
Finally, consider the order of items, placing the most important items like ‘Contact Us’ or ‘Log In’ in the top right corner.
3. Remove out of date information
Out of date information could include advertisements for events that have already happened, discontinued products, bios of team members that no longer work for the company, out of date copyright line and/or time-sensitive information like a job ad.
Google rewards content that is fresh, relevant and useful and penalises those with “low quality” content. Out of date information falls into this low quality category.
Your options then are to remove or update. We talk about updating content in the next section and focus on how to best remove copy now.
By removing out of date content you can:
Improve your site’s search rankings
Increase your site’s crawlability*
Enhance your brand’s credibility
Provide a better user experience
*Crawlability (noun)
Semrush defines crawlability as “a search engine’s ability to access and collect i.e. ‘crawl’ content on a page”.
The more crawlable your site is the easier it is to index and this can help your SERP ranking. If you update your site regularly, crawlers will index your site more frequently and this is a good thing.
When removing content there are some best practices to follow to keep Google happy.
Neil Patel advises using a 301 redirect if there is a more up to date copy. A 301 is a permanent redirect and will send users requesting an old URL to the new URL.
If there isn’t another page to redirect visitors to then you can add a 410 Deleted status. This tells Google and other search engines that this page was intentionally deleted and isn’t returning.
If you have a page that you want to keep on your site but remove from Google’s search you can add a No-index tag. A No-index tag is good for a page that offers little value to the person searching or one that is thin on content but nevertheless needs to be on your site.
Examples where you might use a No-index tag, include an admin page, thank you pages, pages containing sensitive content and pages that require a paid membership to access.,
Remember that even after you remove out dated content, it can still appear in cached data or on Google featured snippets for several weeks, even months. If you need to remove the content ASAP then you can make a request using Google's Removal Tool.
4. Refresh content, particularly blog posts
If you have a large site and have invested significant time and energy into creating content for that site, it is worth revisiting the material and making sure it is completely up to date.
Do a quick content audit to separate your content into three buckets - evergreen content, time-sensitive content and high performing content.
Evergreen Content - this is content that is always relevant - think FAQs, How-to Guides, Checklists, best practices, glossaries, and case studies. Evergreen content forms the backbone of a successful content strategy. It is worth reviewing regularly and tweaking as necessary.
Time-sensitive content - this might include industry reports, statistics, and tech updates. The type of information (e.g. Small business website trends) will always be relevant but the specifics need to be updated for each year replacing for example 2020 Small Business Website Trends for 2022 Small Business Website Trends.
High performing and popular content - use your analytics to identify your high performing content and then look to see how you can update and expand it to make it even more popular.
In addition to refreshing content - think about how you might be able to repurpose and repackage material.
For example, you could repurpose a popular blog post and make it into a podcast episode or a YouTube video. Or you could take three short related blog posts and repackage them into one longer, higher ranking blog post.
When reviewing content, also consider some of the hygiene factors that might be hurting your site and address those - things like updating metadata, adding alt text, refreshing keywords and ensuring links are distinguishable from the rest of your text.
5. Update imagery especially on your homepage
A picture tells a story in nanoseconds so you want to make it’s telling the story you want - a story of a business that is trustworthy, relevant and dynamic. Out of date photos - don’t communicate this - they give the impression of a business that is out of touch and doesn’t care. Even if your site has great images - it’s worth switching them around to keep your site looking fresh.
If you are pushed for time, focus your attention on the home page and be sure to update this imagery regularly - especially above the fold.
I find stock imagery dates quickly and certain types of stock images can become ubiquitous making your brand look generic and boring. So take a critical eye to your stock images and ask yourself if the image is still working for you and your visitors.
If you can afford it, hire a photographer and create your own image bank. If that’s not possible, speak to a graphic designer about how to use stock photography more imaginatively to create images that stand out and truly reflect your brand personality.
This is also a good time to make sure your images are optimised.
6. Confirm your pages look good on mobile.
This is a really important one. According to Statcounter 53% of all website traffic in the UK is from mobile devices. Worldwide it's closer to 60%.
And it’s not just passive mobile traffic that is increasing, it’s also active mobile buying. The embrace of mobile wallets and contactless credit cards is making mobile commerce easier and more convenient. In fact, Insider Intelligence predicts US m-commerce volume will hit $620.97 billion or 42.9% of e-commerce in 2024.
Sadly too many small businesses are missing out on the opportunity that mobile provides by having sites not properly optimised for mobile.
As always there’s an app for that. Google’s mobile friendly test is the best place to start. Page Speed mentioned earlier also helps to check mobile optimisation. You could also try MobiReady.
So what makes a site mobile friendly?
Responsive design*
Large readable text
Compress images
Simple navigation
Links that are spaced out - if they are too close together - it becomes too easy to hit the wrong link
No pop-ups
Easy to use search function
Speed up everything
*Responsive Design (noun)
Is an approach to building websites that considers different devices that visitors might use to access a site from desktop to tablet and mobile and automatically adjust the content to display on the chosen device.
The goal of responsive design is to ensure that website users have the same experience across all devices.
Note: One of the reasons we to design using Squarespace websites is because they are designed out of the box to be responsive on devices meaning you don't need to create and maintain separate sites for every potential device, browser and display width.
7. Add new content - testimonials, case studies, new projects, video
Look for ways to quickly add new content to your site. Add recent testimonials or case studies. Maybe add a description of a new project. More and more websites are adding a video element to their websites. Why? Because high-quality short video gets watched by visitors and converts better.
Final Thoughts…
Once you're done your spring cleaning, give it one final look over and make sure the key information is easy to find, the navigation is simple and the site looks inviting. Then ask someone else to take a look, ideally someone unfamiliar with your site so they can approach it with a truly fresh perspective. And remember we are always here to help if you want a professional opinion.
Spring Cleaning Check List
Update broken links and and address slow loading pages by optimising images, removing unused code and reducing redirects.
Focus on your homepage and ask what can I improve and what can I remove to make visiting my site a better experience. Think about reducing clutter, adding more whitespace, simplifying navigation and making the site easy to scan.
Take a methodical approach to removing content, understanding the needs of your visitors and Google’s approach to crawling and indexing sites.
Review evergreen, time-sensitive and high performing content and make sure it is completely up to date. Take the time to also update metadata, alt tags and keywords and ensure links are clear.
Update old photos and give stock photography a new twist so that all imagery truly reflects your unique brand
Test your website on various mobile devices and adjust accordingly to create a better mobile experience for visitors.
Look for quick ways to update your site. Maybe add a new testimonial or updates on a new project. Consider adding video to your site.
