A couple month’s back, WordPress did a huge update that affected a ton of website themes. The ones that were most affected were the ones that use the most user-friendly platforms with complex structures like Divi and Movado.
What does that mean? It means a whole bunch of websites were broken in the process and many small businesses didn’t even know their websites weren’t working! Many businesses put their website updates on auto pilot if they don’t have someone monitoring internet changes. This is a huge mistake unless the website is being check regularly to make sure the update went smoothly.
Luckily, For Marketing Matters’ clients weren’t affected. The overall reason they weren’t affected is because we have a full-time website specialist taking care of all things website related. He keeps up with the constantly-changing Wild West that is our online world. Things move so quickly that, if you aren’t keeping an eye on the ball at all times, your website could end up clunky and dysfunctional. That conveys the message to your customers that your business is run clunky and dysfunctional too.
Another recent big deal is the Google maps policy change and linking. That affected anyone who has a Google map plugin on their website. Anyone who didn’t keep up with that change now has broken Google mapping on their site.
There is no rhyme or reason for when and how these things change, so it’s extremely important to stay on top of your website management. Not doing so can be costly in terms of your Google ranking and your online reputation at large.
What did our developer do differently?
1.) He keeps on top of WordPress news constantly and other important news channels that tell him about changes in the website platforms our clients use.
2.) He uses a compatability matrix to determine how the different website themes of our clients will be affected by updates and knows the actions he must take BEFORE our clients are impacted.
3.) He is always monitoring news channels for website plugins that are security risks, so he can remove them and find replacements.
4.) He has an understanding on how third-party applications like Google (with their recent Google map change) will impact our clients’ websites and stays on top of changes that need to be made in response to that.