Websites Are Living, Breathing Things

Maybe Not Breathing; Yet!

Every free consultation contains some variation on the same statement: websites are alive.

This sounds like a radical concept, but when you really think about it, is it that strange? We often view businesses as being alive. They require care, consideration, and regular ongoing maintenance for success. To remain competitive, businesses innovate and pivot as time moves on and the market shifts. The products and services in the business are always under review for improvement. Proactive business decisions often lead to better results than reactive ones, especially when the business is a driver of the market. Each team member of the organization must work together, much like differnt biological systems in nature. Those same people learn and improve over time. Many business management systems are based on the same successful natural systems we see in our world everyday.

Websites and digital products really are no different. They are just one smaller subsystem of the larger enterprise, and like each of these business topics, need just as much nurturing to remain a healthy component of the business ecosystem. Without care and attention, they will slowly suffer and become less impactful as time goes on. Once you become more familiar with the aspects in which this is true, you may even start to see it yourself as you surf the World Wide Web.

Clients who seek out PxO Ink LLC for a long-term retainer, especially those who are looking for custom software development, often come to the same conclusion with their own websites and website applications. Websites are living, breathing things.

The Bare Minimum Trap

There is a belief that just having a website, or even a social media page, is enough to cover your bases on the Internet. This couldn't be further from the truth. In reading our earlier article on whether you even need a website, one of the most important points covered is that not investing in your Web or online presence could deny you a significant portion of your customer base.

This leads us to the bare minimum trap, which is a similar, long-held belief that once you have established a Web or online presence, you don't really need to do much to care for it after release. Again, this couldn't be further from the truth. Like a physical storefront, the greatest initial cost of building a website is often the first build, but over time, if you want it to grow with changes in the market, you also need to put time and effort in to maintain and improve it.

When a website or application is neglected, not only is it vulnerable to security concerns, it also becomes vulnerable to becoming stale. Websites that do not change with time often fail to thrive. When customers view a stale website, they may question whether the business itself is still operating effectively.

Unlike in-person experiences, websites are snapshots at the time they're visited. Outside of support situations, very rarely do customers get the opportunity to interact directly with website owners in real-time. Therefore, keeping the website updated is how you show customers that the organization is thriving and ready to accept their business. Sometimes being dynamic is the only way to be engaging.

If your competitors are taking advantage of maintaining and improving their websites over time, then you are at an even greater disadvantage because now not only do you look stale, but you also look non-competitive. Customers are always looking for the business that will meet their needs.

Not only do you need to put your best foot forward when attracting customers, in order to retain them and to encourage a strong and loyal community, you need to continue to give them reasons to revisit and continually engage with your business. In the Information Age, that means putting the effort long-term into your Web or online presence.

This is even more crucial for online businesses and website applications, where user feedback and consistent improvements to the user experience are a critical business expense. When online businesses or website applications become stale, which can often happen much faster and more frequently than informational websites, it can sometimes lead to complete business failure. Maintenance is sometimes not enough: you must be willing to reinvest in your business to continue growth.

These points are especially poignant when we talk about proactive-versus-reactive development. If you are always reacting to the website being stale, then you are constantly under additional pressure to maintain previous success. When you focus on proactive investment and maintenance, you are more aligned with being a driver in the market.

The bare minimum trap convinces business owners that they don't need to reinvest in their business to continue to succeed. However, we know, that which deserves to be done often deserves to be done right. This is true for every aspect of your business, including those aspects online.

The Two Components

There are two things that business owners need to focus on long-term: technology and content. The technology and infrastructure that you use require constant maintenance, innovation, and feature improvements to stay competitive. Content is also ever-evolving with the forward march of time, but it must also continually entice new customers and users for engagement. They work hand-in-hand, but they are two separate systems that need the same courtesy of nurture.

Technology

Think about the technology that you use every day. Operating systems update frequently. Browsers add new features seemingly every day. Technology stacks are always improving. Sometimes these changes are to improve security, but most of the time these are changes that are needed to remain competitive and appealing to customers. Are digital products for your business really any different? Without the underlying technology and infrastructure, are you able to effectively serve your customers with new and interesting content?

Changes to technology do not always have to be drastic. This is sometimes a misunderstanding about what customers and users are actually looking for. Plants do not need to grow ten feet tall overnight to show the world that they are still alive and thriving. The same is true for websites and website applications. With a qualified team backing your business, you can find the areas that actually need attention and focus on those instead.

PxO Ink LLC often builds websites that stand the test of time, and in some cases, have lasted for a decade or more. That means you do not have to redesign your website or application frequently, although you should certainly do it more frequently than that. You don't need to constantly push new bleeding-edge innovations either. Sometimes it's just enough to consistently improve the user experience of what's already working. Ultimately, you do need to consider improving your technology and its implemenation over time. This is especially true if the underlying technology is evolving to improve both security and the user experience. We know what happens when infrastructure is neglected.

Incremental or Iterative Development

In order to remain competitive, PxO Ink LLC often recommends incremental or iterative development. This is an architecture philosophy related to living websites, where small regular changes based on user feedback are made to ensure that the website remains fresh and competitive. These choices are proactive, rather than reactive, and often discover pain points before they grow out-of-control. Incremental or iterative development does not mean releasing half-baked or incomplete features. Quite the opposite. It's about the reality that you're never really building for yourself. In fact, you are often building for your customers and their needs. This is an important distinction which can effectively put into focus what the purpose of a website or website application is.

Content

Content, like technology and infrastructure, also needs to evolve over time. When we talk about content, we're not just talking about the advertising and marketing materials that are produced to engage new customers. This category also represents the underlying products and services that the business provides. Most importantly though, it's the content on your website or website application that needs to evolve with changes in your business and your customer's needs. We know that these things need to shift with changes in society (like regulation.) Challenging the business to create better content, and to innovate, is something that needs to be considered regularly in order to remain competitive.

Maintaining and improving your content over time is also critical for ensuring your business remains accessible to larger untapped audiences. In our Search Engine Optimization and GEO Guide, we talk more about how you can refine your content and improve it over time to benefit your reach.

Effort In, Results Out

In business, it is believed that the amount of effort that you put in is related to the results that you receive. Generally speaking, once you have a solid working system in place, then the more focused investment you put toward it, the better your results are; and in some cases, your reward is exponential growth. Some of the largest organizations in modern history have used this paradigm to dominate their respective industries.

This is certainly true for websites and website applications too. The more concentrated effort you put into your website or application, and the more effectively you respond to the needs of your customers and users, the better your results. When you have happy users, you have repeat customers.

Now that the Internet has become a major component of our society, it can sometimes feel demanding or overwhelming for businesses to put this much effort toward their websites. The reality is that the Web has offered businesses a gift in the form of huge market potential, and capitalizing on that by taking advantage of building strong and reliable presences online is the best path toward success.

You can ensure strong results when you make ongoing investment in your website or website application a formal cost of doing business.

Help! I'm Alive

Websites are alive and they need help to stay that way. They don't all need attention every day, but all of them do need maintenance, care, consideration, and nurturing to continue to be available and effective for the users and customers who visit them daily.

Looking for PxO Ink LLC to review your website, application, or want to talk about how we can build you a thriving solution? Contact us today!