Blog courtesy of WordWrite Communications, a fellow PRBI member

When was the last time your company performed any kind of audit of your website? Have you reassessed your content and keywords for peak optimization lately? More than likely, you’ve answered “no” to these questions.

If it’s been a while (or never) since you’ve really assessed the content on your website, here’s six great reasons why you should make it a priority today.

1. Ensure content is accurate and up-to-date 

Performing a website audit allows you to reassess the accuracy of the information on your website. Is your product information out of date? Are there biography pages on your site from former employees? This is all content you shouldn’t have on your website – for good reason – so auditing your website gives you a great opportunity to freshen up the accuracy on your pages.

Think about it. When potential customers are searching for solutions or more information on an issue they’re encountering, they’re searching for relevant content and answers to their questions. This should be reason alone that you should optimize your website content – let alone when they do come across your business organization upon a search engine results page, you’ll want to keep them on your website and coming back again later.

2. Improve SEO

Hopefully by updating the accuracy of content on your website, you’re simultaneously optimizing your keywords for SEO along the way. One of the most important elements – if not THE most important element – of search engine optimization is certainly the keywords on your website. According to the Beginner’s Guide to SEO Keyword Research from Moz.com, “ranking for the ‘right’ keywords can make or break your website.” Therefore, the importance of optimizing the keywords on your website for SEO is crucial.

As Moz.com explains, “search engine optimization involves constant testing, experimenting and improvement.” Take a look at what keywords have performed well against your analytics. Ensure that those keywords are strategically peppered throughout your website. At the same time, take a look at what keywords are performing poorly, and update or remove them from the wrong pages on your website.

3. Identify missed SEO opportunities

You probably didn’t fully understand which keywords would rank better than others when you initially established keywords on your website. But have you reevaluated your webpages since then? Probably not. All the more reason to audit your website to identify any SEO opportunities that you’re missing out on.

HubSpot makes it simple, if you’re using this platform to host your website. They provide extensive page performance statistics and suggestions for better optimizing elements on a page. Pages that have suggestions from HubSpot even have a color-coded icon next to them to add simplicity to the already overloaded marketer’s life. This has been one thing I’m reliant on while truly optimizing a website, ensuring that I’m not missing out on any SEO opportunities.

4. Don’t forget about those images!

SEO doesn’t only apply to keywords on your website pages, but also encompasses optimizing your images, too. Not only should you frequently audit the alt text behind those images that make your website look so pretty, but also keep in mind the image size in regards to optimization. HubSpot recently published a blog entry on optimizing website images to garner more leads that indicates “by decreasing the file size of the images on your landing pages, you can increase conversion rates and get more leads.” Who would have known? Google – that’s who. Keeping current about factors like reducing the size of website images can really help with your overall website optimization for SEO.

5. Reevaluate navigation of website content

By auditing your website, you now have another chance to reevaluate if the navigation of your content makes sense and is as user-friendly as possible. The last thing you want is a prospect visiting your website and getting lost in the complex navigation or who is unable to find information because your website is too simplified. Keeping the navigation elements of your website in mind is certainly a best practice for really optimizing your company site.

6. Keep in mind your buyer personas

As with any facet of inbound marketing, always keep your buyer personas in mind when optimizing your website. The content created and keywords used for SEO should be tailored to fit their goals or challenges they’re facing. If your content is failing to resonate with your target audience, you should be reevaluating your website optimization strategy to ensure you’re answering those necessary questions being asked by prospective customers.

What steps are you taking to continually optimize your website?

Take a look at this free Search Engine Optimization kit from our friends at HubSpot to really get the most out of your website optimization and SEO strategy.

If you’re in healthcare, insurance, technology or other professional services industries, and need help with a PR, marketing or social media campaign, contact Scott Public Relations.

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