We believe that every website needs to be managed and cared for if it is to fulfill its purpose for existence. Yet, thousands of sites are ignored and go unattended and many of those business owners wonder why their sites are not working for them.
Why Our Websites Need To Be Managed
When we stop and think about it, we can see why a website needs to be well cared for.
To Communicate Relevant Information: A website is a marketing tool that communicates through the Internet. Our websites must keep up with our current message and communicate relevant information about what we offer.
To Attract New Customers: As a marketing tool, our websites give us an excellent way to attract more visitors, entice them to become customers, and cajole them to be repeated clients. If our website is to complete its mission, it needs to be checked frequently to ensure it stays on course.
To Keep Up With Technology: Technology has a way of improving things and it certainly has done so with our websites. By taking advantage of some recent changes, our websites can be vastly improved; giving a larger message, taking up less web space, being viewed over more devices, and reaching a greater audience—if we take care of our site.
To Ensure It Is Working Properly: Things can and do go wrong. Even with our websites. A link might break, a photo goes missing, a message gets out of date, a policy no longer applies, etc. Our websites need both preventative and repair maintenance steps to ensure our websites stay in good working order.
Approaches to Website Management
There are four ways that you can approach the care for your website.
Ignore It: You can do nothing: don’t help your website complete its mission. Simple leave it alone and let it set there to merely take up web space. Let whatever happens happen.
Do It Yourself: You can go beyond the responsibility for your website and complete the management tasks yourself, making sure it communicates accurately, attracting visitors, and working properly.
Get A Friend To Do It: You could appeal to a friend to manage your website. It could be more economical to do so. But, if you do, ensure you have a working contract and hold you friend accountable. Friends working for friends offer a lot of ways to break up good friendships.
Hire A Professional: If you are really serious about your website, yet you don’t have the time or expertise to complete the management process yourself, your best bet is to hire a professional. It will cost you a fee, but you are guaranteed a good working website.
The Difference Between Maintenance and Management
Most of the time, website management is thought of as website maintenance. What maintenance includes is left up to the individual technician or company that offers it. And it is priced at their discretion regardless of what it includes. Even if you had a maintenance plan, If your site was broken and needed to be fixed, it could cost extra.
Inphase noticed that some of its clients needed different types of maintenance—and more or less—than others. As a consequence, Inphase broke up the maintenance procedure, separating the different areas of a proper functional website and came up with the need for different areas of management rather than a universal maintenance plan.
Separating the working areas of a website resulted in two things that greatly helped our customers:
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It provided four areas of management allowing the client to choose only the area needed
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It provided a means of pricing according to the level of management involved and allowing the client to pay for only the level he or she needed
Determining Your Management Needs
The following list identifies Inphase Management and gives you an idea of what your management requirements might be:
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Update is to furnish your website with fresh, current information
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Maintenance is to inspect your website on a routine bases to ensure it is working properly and repairing any part that is broken
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Development is to add to or change the structural appearance of the site to make improvements or additions to it
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Promotion is making others aware of your website and attracting them to it
