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Have you ever thought about the health of your website? If you haven’t, now is a perfect time to start! Just like our own health, websites have several areas that need to be checked regularly to make sure they are running at their best.

Scan for website vulnerabilities.

Unfortunately, there are people out there who want to break into your website and exploit any possible weaknesses. Therefore, you need to make sure you regularly scan your site for anything that could cause a security threat. Several main areas that are an easy target for hackers include:

• Forms
• Content Management Systems
• Login Pages
• WordPress Blogs

Using tools, such as LKCS’ website vulnerability scan, will find weaknesses and problematic areas that can be fixed to protect you from these sorts of attacks.

Set up secure web hosting.

One of the most important ways keep your website healthy, is to ensure that your website and account holder information is safe and secure. I mentioned the importance of scanning for web vulnerabilities, but it is equally important to have a secure web host. Some important features to consider when looking for a new host should include:

• 24/7 security monitoring
• Basic DDoS protection
• Standard intrusion detection and prevention

It is common nowadays that your website will be one of the first interactions people will have with your organization. If it’s not well protected, you may lose the confidence of those looking to do business with you. Just one security breach could cause irreparable harm to anyone in the financial industry. When your site is not available, one of your most important branches is closed. That is why it is so essential to have a web host that you can trust.

Review your web analytics.

Web analytics track the way that users interact with your website. Data is gathered based on these interactions, which can help you make your website more effective. Some examples of the data you would see in an analytics report are:

• Web Traffic: The number of incoming and outgoing website visitors you receive
• Views: The number of times a page has been viewed
• Clicks: The number of times a link has been clicked
• Unique visitors: First-time visitors to your website per day, per week or month
• Bounce rate: The percentage of visitors that leave the site quickly without interacting contribute to the bounce rate
• Conversion rate: The rate of visitors making purchases from your site, signing up for newsletters or subscribing to a service

Taking this information into account, you can customize your website to better meet the needs of your audience.

Keep up with ADA accessibility guidelines.

In recent years, ADA web accessibility guidelines have become more and more important. Complying with the rules not only prevents your financial institution from costly litigation, but also makes your website more user friendly while reaching a wider audience. This is something that needs to be consistently checked as the website is updated, to make sure that the correct guidelines are being followed. Many of these guidelines need to be accessed manually, so it is important to have a system in place to scan for errors.

LKCS offers a subscription-based ADA web accessibility tool that can help solve a lot of these problems.

In conclusion, creating an effective and engaging website is only half of the process. Maintaining it and constantly evaluating the health of your website is just as important to make sure things continue to run smoothly.