Tending Your Garden

We always tell our clients that a website is not a static archive but rather a living tool that should grow and evolve to meet the needs of your association and membership. At its most impactful, a website is like a well-maintained garden. It requires regular weeding and constant vigilance to keep it from becoming an overgrown mess. Add too many plants, and nothing will thrive. You must be willing to be a bit ruthless in your pruning to ensure sustained growth and health.

Today, PODI would like to recognize our partners at the Tire Industry Association with our first Master Gardener award. Its PODI-supported site (https://www.tireindustry.org/) went live in 2022, and in the four years since the team has stayed on top of content, introduced new elements, and made necessary changes to keep the site clean, relevant, and feeling like new to their members.

After you launch a new site, it can be easy to slowly add back in elements you removed during your content migration. It starts with adding one more item to the utility navigation. Next, there is one more thing that must be featured on the home page. And that webinar with only 12 views in the last three years that you left behind? Someone asked about it, so it must be reposted. Before you know it, your new site is an unkept jungle of overly large navigation menus and unneeded content.

A new site is an opportunity to trim out the detritus and old growth to focus on the information and resources your members really need. Keep it clean, and your site will continue to blossom for years after launch.