After launch: the first 90 days of a new website

Launch day is exciting. After weeks of planning, design and development, the new website is finally live. It is tempting to treat that moment as the finish line, but the most valuable improvements usually happen in the weeks that follow, once real people start using the site.

This is the 90-day plan we follow with our clients.

Days 1 to 7: check everything twice

The first week is about catching problems before visitors do.

• Forms and email. Submit every form yourself and confirm the messages arrive, including on mobile.
• Redirects. If old pages moved, make sure every old address redirects to the right new one. Broken links lose both visitors and search rankings.
• Search Console. Submit the new sitemap and watch for crawl errors.
• Analytics and goals. Confirm that enquiries, calls and purchases are being recorded correctly.
• Backups and security. Check that automatic backups are running and that you can restore one.

Days 8 to 30: watch real behaviour

Now the data starts to mean something. Look at how people actually move through the site:

1. Which pages do visitors land on first? They are not always the homepage.
2. Where do people leave? A high exit rate on a key page is a clue, not a verdict.
3. Which buttons get clicked and which are ignored?
4. How fast do pages load for real visitors on real phones?

Your analytics will show you what people do. Talking to a handful of customers will tell you why.

Collect questions from your sales and support teams too. If people keep asking the same thing, the website should answer it.

Days 31 to 60: fix and improve

By the second month there is usually a clear list of improvements. We prioritise them by impact and effort:

• Rewrite headlines and calls to action on pages that get traffic but few enquiries.
• Add answers to frequent questions, often as a short FAQ on the relevant page.
• Improve images and scripts on any page that is slow on mobile.
• Expand thin pages that are close to ranking for valuable search terms.

Small, steady changes add up. Many of the best-performing websites we look after are the result of dozens of modest improvements rather than one big redesign.

Days 61 to 90: plan for growth

With three months of data you can plan with confidence. This is the time to agree on the next phase:

• A content plan built around the questions your customers search for.
• Landing pages for campaigns, services or locations.
• Regular reporting that focuses on enquiries and revenue, not just traffic.
• A care plan for updates, security and small improvements every month.

A website is never finished

The businesses that get the most from their websites treat them like any other part of the business: something to measure, maintain and improve. Launch is simply the moment the real learning begins.