5 Necessary Steps for a Successful New Website Launch

It really doesn’t matter if you’re a brand new business launching a website for the very first time, or a long-standing, “seasoned” business who has decided to build their presence online with a sparkling, new site – building and launching a website is one of the most stressful, complicated tasks you’ll ever do from a business perspective. 

A website is crucial to your success in today’s business world, no matter what industry you’re in or the size of your market. More often than not, a website is where you’ll first greet potential customers and nurture relationships with your current ones. The value of a well built, high performing website can’t be overstated. 

If you’ve ever even attempted to launch a site, then you know first hand that things can – and will – go wrong. Something as simple as a misspelled word in the wrong place can interfere with your SEO, and that’s just the simple end of what can go wrong. While issues are bound to occur during and shortly after your launch, there are steps you can take to make your launch smoother, and overall more successful. 

1. Test For Usability

Putting your website out there without first testing for usability on multiple levels is a huge mistake. You have to make the assumption that traffic is going to start streaming to your website the moment you launch (even if in reality it takes a little longer), and you don’t want to lose those first few visitors because they unknowingly played the role of guinea pig in measuring the usability of your website design. 

When testing for usability, look specifically at elements that can affect the user experience. For instance, you’ll want to test the following features:

• Navigation. Can someone who is unfamiliar with your site easily find what they’re looking for?
• Does your web design help lead the visitor to the next step, and will they intuitively know how to get there?
• Will your website perform on various browsers?
• Have you build a site with responsive design? Will your current web design provide a seamless user experience across all devices?
• Is it easy for visitors to identify how to sign up for lead offers, make purchases, or contact you?
• Does the content on every page of your site have a purpose?
• How long does it take for your pages to load? More than just a few seconds can turn away visitors. 

2. Optimize for SEO

Before you officially launch it’s a good idea to have search engine optimization analysis done on your website – especially if you built your website or had someone on your team do most of the heavy lifting. No matter how experienced you may be in web design, there are details that a professional in web development can pick up on, one of them being how effectively your site will perform for SEO. 

Having an SEO analysis of your website completed before you launch will ensure that you’re maximizing all the efforts you’re putting into SEO and that you’re not missing out on valuable opportunities to connect with your target audience. 

3. Take Care of the Details

There’s also a list of all the “little things” that need to be done during a launch that often get left on the sidelines. With so much movement going on, it can be easy to forget about some of the more minor details but neglecting them can come back to haunt you in a big way. 

If this is your first website, or your domain has changed, you’ll want to go in and make changes on applicable sites and platforms. For instance, social media, and online directories, including Google My Business. 

You’ll also want to take a few minutes and make sure your web address is current for Google Analytics and Google Search Console. Doing this not only means that Google will be able to index your site more effectively, you’ll also have the analytics that you need to fine tune your new site shortly after its launch. 

4. Backup Your Site

Whatever you do, don’t forget to back up your site before you launch. Doing this will ensure that your data won’t be lost and add an extra layer of security to your site. Plus, if any malware or ransomware makes it way onto your site, having copies of it ensure that you’ll minimize downtime and risks to your website visitors. This is important even if you’re a new or relatively small business. Smaller scale businesses are often the target of cyber criminals based on the fact that they’re often unprepared, and unable to recover from an attack. 

5. Promote Your Launch

There has been a lot of blood, sweat, and tears poured into your new web design. The day you launch is an exciting time, and it’s only natural that you want to tell the world about it. Plus, the sooner you start promoting that sparkling new website, the faster you’ll start seeing a surge in traffic, thanks to all the effort you put into making sure it’s completely optimized for SEO. 

Pick a day to launch your new site, but make sure you give yourself plenty of time to work out all the glitches before the big day. Then use the other digital marketing tools you have at your disposal, like social media and email, to spread the word and get traffic moving to your new site once it finally goes live. 

Get Off to a Great Start with an Award-Winning Web Design Team

When it’s time to build a polished new website that delivers results for your business, there’s no better place to turn than Boston’s top web developers at GoingClear. We’re the pros in web design, and we know exactly how to create a site that builds your presence online. We invite you to reach out to us and speak with one of our web development experts on how we can help you build a website that performs, without missing a beat. Contact GoingClear to learn more today.