This list assumes a WordPress website. The time between actions varies depending on the size of your site and how dynamic it is. But some are important often.
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Website Hosting
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A computer has to store all the files associated with your website so that when someone wants to visit, that hosting computer/company can feed the website to the visitor's browser. These days, the security and speed of a website are paramount for conversion and search engine ranking. Even though hosting can be purchased for as little as a few dollars per month, paying a little more is a worthwhile investment.
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Check Site Uptime
Continuously monitor your website uptime using a service to send you an emails the instant it goes down.
Update Wordpress Version
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WordPress is constantly upgrading and updating its platform to improve features, performance, and security. A website must be checked before each one of these upgrades to insure it still works properly. It might affect performance or even cause some features to break. Many times this is due to the use of plugins that are no longer compatible with the new version.
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Update all Plugins
Plugins are miniature programs used in Wordpress sites uploaded to perform a specific function. These need to be updated frequently either because the functionality changed or because the need to comply with a new, upgraded version of Wordpress.
Check Desktop Site Speed
Confirm the website is preforming at peak speed every month. As platforms such as wordpress release upldated versions, it can affect the performance of existing sites. Malware can also cause performance issues.
Check Moible Site Speed
Check mobile speed independently of desktop speed. It will be part of the Google Page Speed check but check independently if your mobile site has a different url.
Confirm All Pages Pass Core Web Vitals
Confirm XML Sitemap Working
Confirm All pages in XML Sitemap Indexed
Check Google index for useless pages
As a website changes, it can create broken links or extra pages in Google's index that should not be there. A check of Google's index by searching "site:mydomain.com" can help identify any unnecessary pages that could affect search engine performance.
Check for messages or manual action in Google Search Console
Google can communicate with website owners through the search console. Messages could be about error pages or as serious as manual actions taken against the site which could drastically affect performance in search results. The search console should be checked periodically.
Check for crawler errors Webmaster Tools/Search Console
Google's Search Console also identify any crawler errors it comes across. These should be fixed.
Send Website Forms Checks
Forms need to be checked periodically to confirm receipt. Every missed form could mean lost revenue for a company that would never know they weren't coming in unless they are checked. We send a form test every month. Test every form on your website.
Recieve Website Form Reciept Confirmation Reply
After we sent the form check submission, we need confirmation it was received by the person responsible for following up with the potential customer. A form isn't truly checked until we are sure the notification recipient responsible for contacting the lead acknowledges receipt.
Check all phone tracking numbers
Call tracking numbers need to be checked to confirm calls are getting routed properly to the person who handles incoming call leads. A simple call to the tracking number should be good enough.
Site Backup
A website backup should be taken and installed in a local computer to avoid catastrophe after a problem with host servers. Many higher-end hosting companies take automatic backups, but we like to have a local version also.
Confirm Domain Registration
Domain registration needs to be renewed every year. If for some reason, the credit card on file no longer works when the domain is set to auto-renew, the domain could be lost.
Check Menu is Working
Menus tend to break during website updates. They should be check periodically to confirm all dropdowns and flyouts work properly.
Check Mobile Menu
Mobile menus sometimes function independently of desktop menu and should be checked independently. Ideally, check on both Android and Safari browsers since we have seen them produce conflicting results.
Check Mobile Static Header
If the mobile version of a website has a mobile static header, it must be checked once per month since they tend to be buggy.
Update Website Admin User Passwords
Since bad actors are always trying to hack into websites, periodic checking of admins to eliminate inactive users and update passwords is highly recommended.
Update Website Owner Domain Registrar Passwords
Update your password at your registrar, the place you purchased your domain. (GoDaddy, Registrar.com, Network Solutions, etc.)
Check blacklists
Confirm your site is not on a blacklist for spam. Malicious software can be injected into your site without warning or knowledge.
Check Website Review Feeds
Check all phone tracking numbers
Call tracking numbers need to be checked to confirm calls are getting routed properly to the person who handles incoming call leads.
Send Site Backup
A website backup should be taken and installed in a local place to avoid catastrophe after a problem with host servers.
Check for bad external links
Periodically check external links on a website to confirm no spammy links have been injected by malware.
Check for Bad Outbound Links
Outbound links are those that your website links to. These are appropriate as part of the internet exchanging information. These should be checked periodically to make sure they are all going to a current page and that no malware has injected spammy links you haven't seen yet. The link in resources goes to a link checker that can scan your site to find any inappropriate external page.
Check for broken internal links
This could hurt both SEO and customer engagement
Update Website copyright year
Website Updates
Priority
Check for New Coupons or specials
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In the case a business has periodically changing offers or specials, update that info on the website.
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Check for New employees or information
4
If your website has a "Meet the Team" type of page, periodically make sure any changes in people or their information are reflected.
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Holidays or special hours
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Inform your customers of times your business will be closed or change hours. You can have a banner on top where you can display or use a temporary popup.
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New Testimonials
A written, audio-recorded, or video testimonial are very effective ways to establish social proof. These should always be updated with more current happy customers. They are more effective when including more information about what their "problem" was, how you guided them to a solution, and how they enjoy the results.
Pictures and Images
If you have a gallery on your website, don't let it go stale. Add any new pictures or images to your website also.
Page Content Updates
Content needs to be updated as much as possible. Website pages will have better rankings if google sees they modify or add fresh content periodically.
Content Removal
Check for products, services, awards, accreditations, etc mentioned on the website that are no longer warranted. Blog posts are a good place to look.
Add the year to the titile tag
Many topics need to be constantly updated. Therefore, people will add the current year to the search term. Provided your content is up-to-date for the current year, add it to your title tag.
Website Content Addition
Priority
New content is always a good idea to improve SEO and keep a website fresh.
New Products or Services
These should be the first thing added once available. If your company is adding or eliminating a company product or service, it should be reflected on the website.
Project or Case Study
One of the best ways to influence visitors into a customer convertion is to show them you have done it before. If you are constantly adding this type of content to your website, you give visitors the satisfying feeling of confidence you can do it for them. Additionally, if you have one that speaks to exactly what they are looking for, it give you even more credibility.
Long Tail Pages
Develop pages with a more detailed focus than your general pages to both provide additional, more specific information to your visitors and to increase your chances of ranking and getting visitors for that more specific search term.
Keyword Planner
Use Google's keyword planner to find out additional search terms for topics
Google Suggest
Start typing your main keywords and see what Google "suggests" under the search bar as you type. The suggestions are based on search history.
Ubersuggest
tool.io/ and ubersuggest.org. Also look at “related searches” at the bottom of the search results.
Check Google Ads Search Term Report
If you run a Google Ads campaign, the search term report is a great way to find what people are actually searching.
Google Search Console
The performance section of the search console shows a list of the search terms your website received an impression for.
Check Searches on Your Website
If you have a search box set up on your website, check Google Analytics reports to see what visitors have been searching.
Assess High Ranking Websites
Find high-ranking websites in similar types of business in other cities and see if there are any pages they have on their site that you could create for your city.
Create local top ten lists
These are great to provide local relevance for local businesses. The best situation if the list is based on the expertise your business provides.
New Blog Post
A general rule of thumb is that website pages are evergreen (pages won't change much over time) and blog posts are more timely, what is happening at the moment.
New developments in your industry
This is the best way to use blog posts. Prove to the visitors you are a trusted experienced expert in your craft. Tell them about changes for the good and bad and what the implications are for you and the visitor.
Situational Post
Write about a situation where you guided your customer through a challege or problem, whatever you do for them.
Many other ideas
Google "Blog Post Ideas" and the choices will be endless.
Videos
See complete section below on video creation.
New Content Checklist
Priority
Unique Content
All content added to your website should be unique, first published on the internet by you. Generally, content should be at least 300 words to qualify as "enough." However, if the point can be made in less, that is fine. And, of course, if it take more, that would be even better. The most important quality of new content is that it will be read and enjoyed by visitors. One piece of extraordinarly good content is worth many times that of poor or moderately good content.
Use a unique or stock image
Every page is more effective with a photo, illustration, graghic, or diagram. Ideally, they are original pictures or illustrations that the web has never seen before, created by the company publishing, and relates to the topic at hand.
Use engaging descriptive title with keywords
The title of the content, especially a blog post, should entice visitors to read it. While the keywords targeted by the content are naturally included, do your best to make sure as many can be include as possible without looking spammy.
Use H1 tag with most important keywords
If at all possible without looking spammy, include the most important keywords for the page in the H1 tag. For local businesses, this often includes the city.
Use bullets and H2-5 tags wherever possible
Nobody likes to see a block of text staring them in the face when they get to a web page. Using sub headlines and bullets can break things up and organize it for easier consumption.
Maintain 7px margin between image and text
Text running right up to the picture looks terrible. Leave space around the images.
Use captions for image if appropriate
If an image needs any sort of explaination, captions work well. It can also serve as another way to use keywords to improve SEO.
Link to any on-site pages relevant to text
Any topics referenced in the new piece of content that already have pages should be linked to from the new blog post with the text that refers to it.
Link to any supporting external web pages.
Any web pages or information referred to in the new post should be linked to where appropriate.
Link from pages within website to the new piece of content.
Internal linking is an important way to increase the effectiveness of a website. Look for other places on the site where the reader might be interested in reading this newly published content. The internal links also help search engine optimization. All internal links help distribute power around the website, and to give information about the content of the page using link text and context. Once blog pages are pushed off the main blog page, they often get dropped from the Google index because they have no power. Linking to it from other pages helps keep it in the index.
Even if the best link text is not available to link to the new piece of content, it behooves website owners to create new content within an existing page to facilitate a link that fits.
Create a good meta title tag
See "Offsite Foundational" section for descriptions and best practices for title tags.
Create an effective meta description
See "Offsite Foundational" page for description and best practices of meta descriptions.
Use Image SEO
Specify Search Engine Thumbnail Image
Google is more frequently showing images in search, especially mobile search. You can take measures to influence the one they choose. Make sure you use a square image on the page, near the top, to increase the chances your thumbnail is displayed. If you use the Yoast plugin, the image doesn't have to be actually on the web page, set the featured image within Yoast.
Make sure links are underlined
Link text is routinely underlined as well as a different font color. Make sure that the link text is underlined if that is a practice on the site.
Add Page to Web Page Analysis
Add page to "6-Website Analysis" sheet of this digital marketing plan
For Blog Posts
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Assign category
Assign each blog post to the appropriate category.
Assign Tags if used
Tags are another way to assign topics to a blog post which can be searched later.
Assign author
Most compainies have several people writing blog post. Each should have their own username to have authorship assigned to them. The author usually shows on the blog post itself.
Assign a featured Image
Wordpress and other blogging sites provide the ablity to add a featured image which populates to represent that blog post on the main blog page, category pages, or places where the "latest" blog posts are displayed. Not necessary if your blog does not utilize the featured image.
Confirm featured image looks good
If you add a featurd image, check in the places it shows up (Home page or Blog Page) to make sure it is not cut off or display unwanted margins.
Create an Experpt
Used for a teaser on main blog page and unique content for either main blog page or category pages.
Add Blog Post to Relevant Website Pages
If you have a system to display blogs of a particular subject on that website page's site, make sure new blog posts are assigned the approprirate page or pages.
Videos
Priority
Video Development
Videos are more and more important to your digital marketing efforts. They can help get your message across to visitors who don't feel like reading, begin to develop a relationship with them if the owner or employees are in the video, or convey happy customers in the case of a testimonial video. In addition to conversions, use everything you can to extract the most SEO benefit.
Descriptive Title with Keywords
Much like the title tag of every page on your website, write an SEO friendly title tag. Local businesses should inculde the product or service of the video's topic along with the city or areas that they serve. Keywords closer to the beginning tend to carry more weight. The challenge with a video title is that it is not just a line of code in the webpage, it is the actual title of the video. Take more care to make it flow rather than keyword stuffing.
Location Tagging
Especially important for local businesses, put your Google My Buisness address in the "location" field.
Descriptions
The description is a great way to convey a synopsis of the video to entice viewer to watch it. You can also add calls to action with links to your website or other things you want the visitor to do.
Correct Transcription
Youtube automatically transcribes videos, but go in to edit incorrect words or punctuation.
Tags
Tag the video with descriptive words.
Add Video to Website
If appropriate, add the video to your website. Only high quality videos are good for the home page, but service or product related videos can be embedded on the relavent page or testimonails should be added to the customer reviews page.
Add Video to Google My Business Listing
Even though you upload to Youtube, you still have the opportunity to upload the file to your Google My Business listing. Your listing benefits as you upload content, so add the video to enhance your listing.
Add Video to Facebook
Instead of posting the Youtube link on your facebook page, upload the file so facebook can host and post the video directly. This could increase its reach since facebook naturally favors it's own content. It will also always be there on your page in the "videos" section for people who are "checking you out."
Spread New Content
Priority
The idea for social media posts in regards to website content is to spread it on each platfrom. If you write a compelling intro with a link, you can get people back to your site to consume the content and convert into a customer.
Google Listing Post
Facebook Posts
Instagram Post
Linkedin Post
Twitter Post
Houzz Post
Industry Sites
Google My Business Page
Priority
Check for Google Automatic Updates
Sometimes Google takes it upon themselves or a random person can submit a change to a company's Google page. Google does notify the page's owners for a period of time before changing. This should be checked to stop unwanted changes.
Category
The most important field in the Google Business Listing is the category. Make sure Google does not change, add, or remove any primary or secondary categories.
Services
Google is constantly changing these, adding and removing. Periodically check them to confirm they are correct.
Attributes
There are many other categories of information in Google's business profile. They can include accessiblity, ammenities, crowd, highlights, offerings, etc. These are dependent on busienss type and are always changing. Check often to confirm accuracy.
Seasonally change business category
Perfect example: If you are an HVAC company, make the primary category "Air Conditioning" in the summer, "Heating" in the winter.
Add New Images
Updating images is always a good idea to keep the page fresh.
Geotagged
All images can be geotagged to increase location confidence. This practice was recently tested iby many publishers and revealed to have no affect.
Metadata Name, Keywords, Descriptions and Titles
All images must be named, titled and tagged.
Add Video
Google gives businesses a specific place to upload and video to their Google My Business Page.
Add Holiday Hours
Holiday hours should be entered for any deviation from normal scheduled hours.
Add Holiday Hours to Bing
If you are adding to Google, add to Bing also.
Publish Google Posts
Google gives businesses the opportunity to publish posts to show up on thier knowledge panel (right side Google information on search results). These are a great way to take up more space on the search results while giving searchers more information. When first released, Google posts disappeared from the knowledge panel after a week. Now they are left on continuously, so less frequent posting will not result in the posts disappearing.
Holiday Hours
You can add a post alerting people about holiday hours even though you added them in the "hours" section
New Website Content
Any new blog posts, or any content published on your website can be promoted here.
Recent Facebook Posts
If you are posting on facebook, why not post on Google too. Some of the more casual facebook posts might not be best for Google.
New Reviews
If you get a review on a site other than Google, repost it here to show potential customers you get reviews everywhere.
Events
Any events coming up regarding your business
Remove Bad Images
Bad images can creep into your google business listing. Posts from other Google users are hard to remove, but some can be based on policy violations. You can also try to remove outdated photos.
Answer Google Questions
It is imperative that businesses constantly check for new questions and answer them as the business owner (which it will indicate if answered while logged in as the business owner). It is also another instance Google gives business to show engagement and to add relevant content with keywords and geographic references, great for conversion and SEO.
Send and Answer Google Questions
This seems to be a legit practice. Enter common quesions you get from your customers (especially those that occur as they are trying to figure out who to hire, which is the stage they are in. Answer the questions as the owner.
Search for competitor spam in Google Maps and flag
Businesses are constantly trying to game the Google listings. The most common infraction is including keywords in the business name. For instance, including the city when it is not part of the business name.
Apple Maps allows some types of businesses to leave updates on thier listing, much like Google Posts
Check Menu
Restaurants need to make sure the menu is correct.
Add Photos
Always add photos to all listings
Update "Good to Know"
These are much like Google attributes. These will most likely be changing frequently as Apple rolls out more features.
Email Marketing
Priority
Email marketing is still considered to be the best value in digital marketing. Much of its effectiveness depends on the contact list and how it is assembled. An email with content recipients crave to a healthy list of opt-in contacts bears lots of fruit.
Send a periodic email
Some Companies send a drip campaign for days after signup while others send only when they have something to say. Send whenever you have something compelling for recipients to read.
New services/products
Discounts or specials
Seasonal change reminders
New employees
Updates to your industry
Promote new content
If you recently published a great case study or new project on your site, send an email to promote it.
Confirm mobile effectiveness
Many email marketing platforms are free, but require a paid version to develop mobile responsive emails. Since a large proportion of emails are opened on a phone, confirm yours looks good on a phone.
Improve External Links
Google established themselves as the best search engine by using "Page Rank", which considered that website with a lot of links to it must be a good site. The beauty of the internet is that everything is interconnected, so if more sites want to "connect" with you, your site must be more valuable. Each link is considered a "vote." Although Google is incorporating more usage data like dwell time and pogo sticking to rank websites these days, external links remain a leading indicator of a website's value.
External links from deep pages (isolated pages, far from the main menu) on a website often fall out of the Google Index, redering the link useless. Companies should track all the links they get and periodically check them to confirm Google still has visibility of the page with the link and help them if necessary.
Create incredibly great content
The best way to get links is organically, as Google intended. Create content on your site so great that other websites find it and natually link to it for the benefit of thier visitors.
Build links to web pages that link to the company's domain
If a web page that links to your company's website is not in the Google index, build links to that page to make sure Google discovers it. Building links to any page that links to your website can help the "power" of that link.
Perform Link Building Questionaire
This questionnaire is a great way to brainstorm for possible links. Many times there are link opportunities a business owner might not realize (such as sponsorships or friend's websites). Periodically answering this questionnaire can elicit ideas.
Looking at external links to your company's competitors website is a great way to find "low hanging fruit" to add links to your link profile. It will frequently illuminate relevant links that will be easier to obtain than most. There are several free and paid and paid tools to use.
Bing gives a lot of link information on competitors in thier webmaster tools.
Vendors
Vendors of your company are a great way to gain links to your site. They are industry specific and feel more compelled than most to give you a link. They often have a page on thier website for thier customers.
Outreach - Contact site owners to obtain links
Another strategy for obtainig backlinks is to outreach to other website who might want to link to content on your site. Publishing industry leading unique content is a great way to make this more effective.
Relevant Blogs
Look for blogs that write about your industry and ask them to write about and link to your site. Obviously, you need to have engaging content on your site that will add value to the site you are asking for a link.
Relevant Websites
Look for websites that could link to your web page to provide more value for thier visitors. A great example of this would be a site that has a fantastic page about one of the items on this plan and asked me to link to it i the resources column.
Manufacturers
News Reporters
Many writers are looking for experts in topics to give input and cite in their article. Several platforms exist to connect these people.
Find blogs or websites in your industry or an industry you serve and offer them content for them to publish on thier site with the understanding they will link back to your site. This strategy has been grossly overdone in many cases, but still effective if not done in a spammy way. This is a great supplemental, not a primary link building strategy.
Convert Brand Mentionls or Citations to links
Any time your company is mentioned on the web, without a link to your website, it is worth inquiring if the publisher could add a one.
Point Blank Link Building Tactics
This is a very comprehensive list of link building opportunities that is updated regularly.
If you sponsor a meetup group, you get a followed link from a high value, localized page on Meetup.com
Chamber of Commerce
Although a paid membership and link, Chamber of Commerce is a fantastic link. It shows involvement in the community, it is a high value link, and it has geographic relevance.
Online Review Management
Priority
Send review requests to all customers
Confirm email request set up is working
Monitor links on requests
Periodically check the sites and links you send to customers in your review request. If you are needing more reviews on one particular platform to spread them out, make that platform more prominent in your request.
Confirm employees are familiar with review systems in place
Constant training on the EyeQuest review system
Add new employees to create review form shortcut
Train any new employees on your reviews request system.
Add new employees to create review form shortcut
Train any new employees on your reviews request system.
Confirm New Reviews Populating Rewiews on my Webstie
If you are embedding reviews on one of your website pages, confirm new ones are populating.
Post new review image on social media
Spread your good reviews to social platforms/Google posts
Respond to all Reviews
There are several reasons to respond to all reviews. First, it shows engagement with customers, great for conversions. Second, it allows you to subtly promote your business using geographic and business related keywords. Lastly, when you inevitably need to respond to a negative review, visitors percive it as less defensive since it is a normal part of business practice.
Employees mentioned in the review should be contacted to leave a response more personalized response.
Try to remove negative reviews
Many times negative reviews are against the review site policy. A good example is a review left by a third party, not the actual customer. These can usually be removed.
Ban people with bad reviews from facebook
People who leave bad reviews on facebook can be banned from the page so only thier friends see the negative review.
Track Results
Priority
Website Visits by Source
Webstie visits are the engine that drive new leads. Monitoring the number of visits over time for direct visits, organic visits, and referral sites is a leading indicator of your digital marketing success.
Google Business Activity/Insights
Activity on your Google listing is very important, even compared to your website visits. They are always adding more information to the dashboard. Currently the best ones to look at are views from direct searches (searching for your brand), discovery (lookng for your products or services), or Branded (competitors). They also tell you about conversions such as website visits, directions requests, calls, and text messages.
Conversions
Track the whole point of digital marketing.
Phone Calls
Keyword level call tracking platforms can tell you where every caller came from, direct visits, referred traffic, paid visits, or organic visits.
Forms
Most forms can be modified to provide the referral link, which gives us a lot of information on the type of visitor who filled it out.
Chats
Chat systems also have referral data available to set up.
Sales Revenue
Sales revenue resulting from digital marketing efforts is the ultimate indicator of success or failure. It is hard to determine the origin of many visits due to maps listings visits and the fact that brand searches are classified as organic visits. The easiest segment to track is paid advertising becaue it is easier to determin a visit came from ads with form referral data and by using keyword level call tracking.
Keyword Rankings
Google Organic
The straight organic ranking of your website.
Google Maps
Since Google Maps is a huge traffic source for local businesses, keep track of your ranking here independently. These results vary widely depending on where the searcher is, so find these rankings from the same place every time to see relative changes. The best way to find the purest ranking is to look at results from a geographic keyword from a location far away.
Category Ranking (Non Directories)
I like to track rankings only in relation to competitors, independent of directories like Yelp.
Mouseflow is a platform that video records the activity on a website so you can get a feeling for the flow of many visitors to find ways to improve the site.
