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PRE-LAUNCH WEBSITE
CHECKLIST
When you’re building a website, there are certain things you need to square away before
you launch it. But all the advice out there on how to make a website can get overwhelming,
so I thought I’d make it a little easier for you. Here’s a checklist of website components you
should have before showing your website to the world!
CONTENT
1. Contact information: Email address, phone number if a business, social media
links, etc. Make yourself/your client easy to get in touch with!
2. Privacy policy: Only necessary if you’re collecting info from users (even email
addresses).
3. Terms of use: Include this if you’re selling items/services on your site.
4. Spelling and grammar check: At a minimum, your website should be typo-free, but
it’s a bonus if the writing is polished in other ways too (phrasing, vocabulary, etc.).
Here are two tools that can help:
a. Grammarly: Chrome extension that checks spelling and grammar as you
type online. Offers contextual spell checker and vocabulary enhancement
b. Ginger Page: Chrome extension offering proofreading, rephrasing
suggestions, translation, live corrections, and favorited text that can by
synced across platforms
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PRE-LAUNCH WEBSITE CHECKLIST
5. Personalization: Make it clear that the visitors are dealing with a real person, not
just a faceless corporate entity. This helps increase trust and build loyalty. A few
options:
a. Social media pages to show real-life connection with the public
b. Pictures of company owner
c. Detailed ‘about’ page
d. Personal stories
DESIGN
1. Mobile/responsive design: A ton of people browse the web on their phones now,
so make sure your site works well across device sizes.
2. Modern and simple: A clean layout is less distracting to site visitors. It allows them
to focus on content and CTA rather than forcing them to pay attention to the design
itself.
3. Typography: Make sure that fonts are easy to read, look professional, and are large
enough so people aren’t squinting.
4. Strong emphasis on focus points: Make sure you bring readers’ attention to
important areas of content by creating a layout that helps the eye travel naturally to
where you want it to go.
5. Professional graphics: Graphics should be high-quality and relevant to the text.
Stock photos should be used in moderation (Pexels is a good place to find them
when you do need them).
6. Visual hierarchy: Each page on the website should flow from start to finish, ending
with a clear next step or CTA.
7. Small details should be on point: Coordinated colors, font size, text contrast, and
proper alignment are important to prevent distraction from the content.
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8. Screen resolution: Sites can now be designed to display 1230px in width, rather
than the previous 980px in width, and still be compatible with all device sizes.
PERFORMANCE
1. Site speed: If your site doesn’t load quickly enough, you’ll lose a lot of people. And
every second counts: someone who’s willing to wait two seconds might be gone in
three.
a. PageSpeed Insights: Analyzes page content and offers advice to speed it up.
Provides clear recommendations for fixing problems on your page and
shows a desktop vs. mobile speed score.
b. Learn more about how to make your site faster here.
2. Security: Make sure visitors know their information is secure when they provide
it--or they may not provide it at all.
a. WordPress offers a range of security plugins you can download (like
WordFence)
b. On WordPress, avoid outdated plugins or those with poor reviews
c. Use secure passwords on to log onto your site as well as with your hosting
company
3. Image Optimization: Use an image optimizer to resize, compress, and optimize
images to make sure they are viewed properly on your site and don’t negatively
affect load time.
a. Smush.it: WP plugin, reduces the size of the image without lowering the
quality.
b. RIOT: Works well with uncommon extensions and provides image
comparison tools.
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4. Back-up your website: Just in case your site does ever get hacked, you need a plan
B. Use one of these methods:
a. BlogVault: Popular WordPress tool to backup, restore, and secure your site.
Plans range from $9-99 a month.
b. Back up without plug-ins through your host or using phpMyAdmin;
third-party back-ups can prevent the ‘all your eggs in one basket’ problem.
c. Backblaze: Popular non-WP tool offering unlimited online backup regardless
of number of files, size, and speed. Plans for $5 a month.
SEO
1. Google Analytics account: Basic features help you improve performance by
tracking and reporting on site traffic so you can address pages that are performing
poorly. Can track users, show how they got to your page and how much time they
spent, etc. Tracks conversion goals.
2. Webmaster tools account:
a. Bing Webmaster Tools: Collects and collates site data so you can see
reports crawl and indexation and analyze site traffic.
b. Google Webmasters: Provides the tools and diagnostic data you need in
order to optimize the performance of your site.
c. YoastSEO: Provides help in SEO focus and placement; analyzes pages for
tags, keywords, etc.
3. No spammy SEO: Google will flag pages that over-stuffs content with keywords, has
spun content, have too many anchor-text backlinks, etc. SEO should be intentional,
but natural.
4. Clean HTML/CSS coding
5. Appropriate tags
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6. Follow basic tips for establishing the right type of SEO-friendly URL for your site.
Go through this checklist before going live and your website will be in great shape for its
first visitors! As always, if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to get in touch.
Have you introduced yourself yet?
If not, come say “hi” on
or
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