A Simple Summer Web Content Audit

When was the last time you cast a critical eye over your website – as if you were someone landing on it for the first time, or even as a seasoned user looking to find something specific?

 

In the old days, people strolled down the high street and went into shops that looked like they might hold the answer to their needs. This is now the job of your website, and once they have landed under your shop front awning on the home page, you need to tempt them indoors by showing them the fantastic solutions you have to their problems. Looking over your web content regularly is vital to make sure it’s as effectively tempting as you intend it to be: sharp, clear and easy to understand.

 

So if August is looking a little less manic than normal for you, put a bit of time aside for an honest appraisal of your website. Here’s my simple summer web content audit…

 

What is a web content audit?

Basically, it’s a review of how your web content is looking to see what’s working, if there’s anything out of date, and anything to improve. And don’t worry, because as my teenager would say, “it doesn’t have to be that deep” – the areas to include in this particular audit are the purpose of each page, what it’s like to visit as a user, your links, and your calls to action.

 

Summer is a good time to tackle it for a few reasons, mainly because it’s a less full-on time for many businesses, and you might have a little more time than usual to update important pages before things kick back into gear in September. Traffic is probably slower as well, so any changes you make will affect fewer website users.

 

Which pages to review first

If you’re short on time, this is the order I’d recommend tackling it, because this is generally the order of importance for your users, and for you:

 

• Homepage
• Services or product pages
• About page
• Contact page
• Top-performing blog posts that support your services.

 

And before you do anything, make sure you’ve got your website stats in front of you – the traffic you’ve had, where they’ve come from, what they’ve looked at, and how many have done what you want them to do. Your web host should be able to point you in the right direction if you don’t know where to get them.

 

What to look for on each page

First of all, pretend you’ve never visited before, and imagine that you’re one of your ideal customers – picture the problem they have that you’re going to solve, and how that feels. Then ask yourself these questions:

 

• Is the purpose of the page clear?
• Does the copy sound right – asking the right questions, solving the right problems, and doing it in a confident way?
• Is it easy to scan and read quickly?
• Is the call to action strong and easy to find?

 

Signs that a page needs work

In an ideal world, you’ll read each page and feel delighted and completely satisfied with how it comes across. But these are the things to watch out for, because they could mean a page needs work:

 

• The overall impression is that its purpose is too vague or too broad.
• It is wordy, but doesn’t do much to persuade someone to choose you.
• The service you actually offer, or why it’s needed, isn’t easy to figure out.
• The tone reads one way, but your brand look and feel has evolved in another direction.
• It gets plenty of traffic, but does not convert those views into sales.
• It contains outdated examples, stats, dates or references.
• Visitors have no clear next step.

 

What to do with your findings

Start with a list of the pages you’re going to review, and as you go through each one, assign it one of four actions: keep, update, combine, or remove, with a few notes about your findings next to each. Then you can start to see what needs actioning first.

 

This is one of those jobs that starts simple, but as you find more issues, it can feel like it’s growing into something unmanageable. If you feel that happening, this is what I’d recommend you when you don’t know where to start:

 

• Concentrate first on your homepage headline. This can be one of the trickiest bits to get right, but it sets the tone for everything that comes underneath for your visitors, so it’s vital.
• Strengthen the main call to action – make sure it’s clear and the links work.
• Refine your services page so it focuses on the outcomes that your customers will have.
• Tighten the About page so it builds trust with your readers within a few seconds – make sure it’s infused with your passion and why you’re the expert they need.
• Refresh your best-performing old blog posts that still bring in traffic. They are still vital to your credibility with Google and need some love too.

 

A simple audit timetable

Following this structure might be useful. You don’t have to do it all in one week, but if you aim to set a day aside for each of these as the summer goes on, you might find it’s more manageable to do it in bitesize chunks.

 

• Day 1: List the core pages you’ll be reviewing.
• Day 2: Review each one as outlined above and log your findings.
• Day 3: Decide which are the worst-performing or most outdated pages.
• Day 4: Rewrite or refine the highest-priority pages.
• Day 5: Check links, CTAs, and give it all the final once-over.

 

And if you don’t have direct editorial access to your pages, you can still do all the above in a Word doc, ready to send over to your web developer for upload.

 

Short on time?

If you don’t have the time to spare this summer, then this one aciton will work for you too: look at your home page as if you’ve never seen it before, and make sure it creates the welcome you want. If it doesn’t, then make a few small tweaks to adjust it. That could make all the difference to your conversion chances when business as usual returns in September.

 

And if your audit reveals more problems than you feel you can fix on your own, give me a shout – because web content is something of a speciality of mine! Drop me an email any time at Rebecca@rlcwords.co.uk