Have you looked at your website lately? Do you look at it every day or just now and then? And when you look at it, what do you see?

Websites get to be a lot like old friends. After awhile, they are so familiar that we see what we expect to see. We assume that what was compelling when the website went live continues to have the same competitive advantage over weeks, months and years.

Nothing is more constant than change on the internet. New websites crop up all the time, and news sweeps across the world in minutes. The search engines that locate websites in web searches regularly modify their search algorithms. This means that strategies for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) that worked weeks or months ago no longer give your website the visibility it once had.

If your website does not offer new content over time, customers, potential customers and others who visit your website may find it uninteresting and quickly move to other sites. Smart competitors regularly update their websites and keep the content current so they gain an advantage that allows them to maintain their appeal to potential customers.

Many business owners feel that--by creating an attractive website--they are adequately marketing their business on the internet. Once the website is up and working, they are satisfied that it will meet their goals for creating a web presence and building their business. If the goal of the website is simply to have a "presence" on the web so that someone can locate basic information like business hours, address and phone numbers, they may be right.

Most business owners expect more from their website. They expect the website to provide them with credibility, leads or direct purchases. To achieve those purposes over time, a website has to remain attractive, current and competitive.

Few websites are so powerful and useful that they continue to achieve those business goals indefinitely without regular review and updates. This process assures that the website continues to present the business in the best light and has a high visibility with the search engines.

Think of the website as being like a retail store display. Smart retailers know they have to change the displays regularly and create attractive window displays that draw customers in.

Your website is an integral component of your business. You continually monitor the effectiveness of every other aspect of your business. The website should come in for a similar critical review.

Here are some recommendations for your regular review of your website.

1.  Begin by looking at how many people are regularly visiting the website. If you do not have a specific system for tracking visitors to your website, Google Analytics can provide you with this information. See if the trend has gone down over recent weeks, remained the same, or increased.

If visits to your website are declining, you probably want to look more closely at factors that have contributed to this decline. If the number of visits is remaining the same, is that number providing you with the returns you expect from the website? Are you getting the sales or contacts that you need from the site?

Look at competitors' websites to see if they have become more current or appealing. Using Google again, check to see what key words in your business are being searched. Look to see how many are mentioned on your website frequently enough to give your site a good ranking in a search. If you or someone on your staff does not have the time or skills to use Google and other tools, you may want to consider working with a company that specializes in SEO and other optimization tools.

2.  Ask your staff and customers to look at your website and give you feedback. Sometimes it is easy to overlook something that is obvious to an observer or website visitor. Getting other opinions gives you an idea of what works well, what could improve and features that would improve the overall effectiveness of the site.

3.  Do a content audit. A content audit allows you to look at the content of your website page by page. It documents what's there and allows you to look at it page by page.

A content audit may show you that important content is buried on the website and should be moved to a more accessible spot. An audit may also allow you to identify areas that are not adequately covered, are redundant or are given too much space on the website.

It is a good idea to look at the results of a content audit in light of your requirements for your website. By looking at the coverage documented in the audit, you can get a fair idea of whether or not your website is actually meeting your business goals for the website.

Any website owner who wants his or her business website to remain competitive must look critically at the content and other features of their website on a regular basis.

A content audit can be a powerful tool in assessing and building your website. Check here next week for specific recommendations for conducting a content audit.

Please share your ideas, comments, questions and suggestions about this blog with us. Feel free to leave comments below or to email Judy at [email protected]. 

Judy Cobb is an independent writer and business writing coach whose clients have included Parsons Engineering, Mattel Toys, The Los Angeles Times and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She has specialized in developing training materials for instructor-led courses as well as interactive online courses and websites. She holds advanced degrees from Columbia University and Stanford as well as an MBA from UCLA's Anderson Graduate School of Management.