Launching website is an exciting process to undergo because first impressions last long. Going live has its own pros and cons. Before publishing the vendor should keep in mind to double check the following checklist.

Internet Speed

In today’s era of high speed internet, time is money. So in order to maximize the response to the website, the internet surfers expect the website to load at a moment’s notice. This is especially the case with images because the surfer will go to some other website if the image does not open instantly. Speed of loading majorly depends on the host and the server on which the site is hosted on.

More importance for Browser compatibility

Testing the links for browser compatibility is a major area of concern. Browser compatibility with Firefox, Chrome and Internet explorer 6.0, 7.0, 8.0 should be a point of major escalations. The website should have a universal look and feel.

Better Avoiding Over Optimization

The content should be optimized but too much of anything is bad for health. So Google’s new algorithm update-penguin will penalize websites for over-optimizing content. The link should appear as natural as possible; the anchor text should be mixed properly. So don’t use the keyword over and over again in the on-screen text.

Black lettering on a white background is the easiest format for the user. If not, such a color scheme should be chosen such that the color is natural and classic.

Link Testing

The links as well as the back-links should be tested and re-tested for error 404 and not working. The net surfer will be peeved if the pages are not loading or loading partially.

Proofreading your content At least Twice

Proof-reading the contents twice is as important as putting a hard-hitting copy. The content should be revised for spelling and grammar.

Analytics

Google Analytics is an industry conformed tool for tracking your software for online visitors. This helps in online marketing as it traces page hits, page views and comments.

On page and off page Optimization

Titles and meta-data are important from the SEO perspective. The functionality of the website should be checked to ensure that the website is consistent with what we want to convey. Validation should ideally be 100%.

Favicon

Favicon brands the pages from within the bookmarks and browser toolbar. To keep the brand consistent, just have a 64px*64px version of your logo, save as an jpeg, rename the file to favicon.ico and upload in the root folder. The code used is

<link rel=”icon” type=”image/x-icon” href=”/favicon.ico” />

Basic SEO

RSS feed should be available when the website has a blog or newsreel. Sitemap (sitemap.xml file) is the single most important docs in the root directory of the website such that the major search engines can index the website.

W3C compliance

W3C compliance is used as a quality constraint and a measure of the site’s online dominance. W3C Compliance for Google is even not perfect, but it’s better to get a W3C validator to check common errors like adding closing tags to code.

Last but not the least a Back up Strategy is the call of the day.

Website launching is an ongoing streamlined process….

Tags: The best practices for your website to go live, website launch

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 15th, 2014 at 12:50 am and is filed under Web Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.