Your first 90 days after launch
A month-by-month plan for the three months after your new website goes live, from checking the basics to reading your first real data and planning improvements.
Launch day feels like the finish line. It's really the start of the period when you learn the most about your website, because real visitors are finally using it. This guide gives you a simple plan for the first three months: what to check, what to leave alone and when to start changing things.
If you haven't yet, start with Your first week after launch. It covers the five small tasks for days one to five. This guide picks up from there.
Before you start: write down your baseline
If you didn't do it before launch, note these numbers now, from the old site if you have them:
Your baseline numbers
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- Monthly visitors.
- Enquiries, bookings or sales per month.
- Your top five pages.
- Any search terms you were known for.
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You'll compare against them at day 90. Key metrics explained shows where to find each one.
Month one: make sure it works
The first month is about catching problems, not judging performance.
Test every form, every week. Send a test enquiry from each form and confirm it arrives. Forms are the most common thing to fail quietly. See Form testing.
Watch your inbox for real enquiries. If you were getting them before launch and they stop, tell us straight away.
Check the site on your own phone. Click through the main pages and your contact route.
Check Search Console for errors. Look at the Pages report for anything that isn't indexed that should be. See Reading Search Console.
Report anything broken while your launch support window is open. It runs 30 days from go-live and covers small fixes tied to the launch. See What happens at launch and handoff.
Don't redesign in month one
Colleagues and friends will have opinions about colors and photos. Write them down, but don't act on them yet. Early reactions mostly reflect the change, not how customers use the site.
If you moved from an old site
Search traffic can wobble for a while after a move as Google processes the new URLs. Google says moves can cause fluctuations in rankings while it recrawls and reindexes a site. Keep an eye on Search Console for "not found" errors and send them to us so redirects can be added. See Don't lose your SEO during a migration.
Month two: tell people and start learning
Now that you trust the site, use it.
Month two
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- Tell your customers. An email to your list, a post on your social channels, a line in your email signature.
- Update your profiles. Make sure your Google Business Profile, directory listings and social profiles link to the right pages. See Google Business Profile for SEO.
- Brief your team. Sales and customer service should know which pages to send people to.
- Look at your first real data. Which pages do people land on? Where do they come from? Which pages lead to enquiries? A tour of the GA4 dashboard shows you where to look.
- Keep a list of questions customers ask. These are your best ideas for content updates later.
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Month three: review and plan
By now you have enough data to see patterns. Set aside an hour.
Compare against your baseline. Visitors, enquiries and conversion rate. Look at trends, not single days.
Find your real front doors. The pages most visitors land on may not be the homepage. Make sure those pages explain what you do and offer a clear next step.
Find the leaks. Pages with plenty of visits but few enquiries are the best places to improve. Signs your website is costing you leads lists what to look for.
Pick two or three improvements. Not ten. Small, specific changes you can measure.
Schedule the rest of the year. What to improve in your website's first year has a quarter-by-quarter plan.
Throughout the 90 days
Throughout the 90 days
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- Keep your logins safe and make sure at least two people at your business can get in. See Website ownership.
- Keep software updated, or make sure someone is doing it for you. See Why websites need maintenance.
- Set a monthly reminder for the monthly site check.
- Use one channel for requests. See How to request new work or changes.
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Common mistakes
- Judging the site on the first week's traffic.
- Making lots of changes at once, so you can't tell which one helped.
- Forgetting to tell existing customers the site has changed.
- Letting the launch support window close with known problems unreported.
- Assuming forms work because they worked on launch day.
Frequently asked questions
When should I expect more leads from the new site?
It depends on your traffic, your market and what changed. Improvements to the message and conversion path can show up within weeks; search-driven growth usually takes months. The ROI of a website redesign has realistic timelines.
Should I start blogging straight away?
Only if you can keep it up. A few useful, well-written pages answering real customer questions are worth more than a burst of posts that stops. See SEO and content marketing.
Who maintains the site after the launch support window?
Ongoing maintenance runs through a care plan, and new work is quoted. See Understanding care plan pricing.
Related guides
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Last updated
Your first week after launch
Five small tasks over five days to get you settled with your new site: save your logins, make a first edit, and know how to reach us.
What to improve in your website's first year
A quarter-by-quarter plan for improving a new website in its first year, so it keeps getting better instead of slowly going stale.