When should I launch website?

[ScottNelson&Co]

I'm about a month away from finishing my website. The structure is there and a little bit content but nothing is available to buy as of yet.

In your experience, when is it best to start hosting the website? I thought I should do it asap so my website will get indexed, but on the negative side it may be discouraging visitors from visiting again. Am I missing anything else?

 

[Vision2]

when its done and ready.

 

[winelabels]

To start with there will be no visitors, so why worry?
Get it up and and get some links asap.

 

[Vision2]

To start with there will be no visitors, so why worry?
Get it up and and get some links asap.

That's really bad advice.

There will be visitors, search engines.

There will also be visitors dripping in from them as well.

You should never launch a site until you are ready to do so, and the nav (urls for everything on the site) is done dusted, as well as content / products in place.

You can launch a site with fewer products, that's fine, and add them as you go, but there needs to be sufficient fill / content / seo to begin with.

 

[matt.chatterley]

I'm about a month away from finishing my website. The structure is there and a little bit content but nothing is available to buy as of yet.

In your experience, when is it best to start hosting the website? I thought I should do it asap so my website will get indexed, but on the negative side it may be discouraging visitors from visiting again. Am I missing anything else?

To some extent I would say it depends on the business - and also the timescale over which your plans for the site are laid out.

If there is little or no substance to it (no products, no content) - then there isn't a lot of point in getting it up early - hence why a lot of people use so called 'holding pages' - maybe with a visual indicator of what you will be doing and possibly a sign-up form for interested parties to join a newsletter.

It's not necessarily best to wait until it is "100% finished" either - as you may never feel that it is! Websites tend to keep growing as you go - so you probably do need to set a point when it will be released. E.g "Phase 1 is this content plus these 10 products - then we'll open and add the next set in the background".

Theres limited point in getting a lack of content indexed. There IS an argument that you can start to 'age' the domain name, at least you'll have been visited by SEs, etc - but I would suggest you need at least *some* decent content up first.

 

[DavidGiant]

Launch your website when it is bug free, renders properly in all major browsers and provides value for whoever is visiting.

I assume you are launching some sort of shop. Why don't you have a landing page with an e-mail entry box. People who enter their e-mail will get 15% off all first purchases. This should allow you to collect a number of e-mails while your site isn't finished.

When your site is ready, send off a mass e-mail to everyone who took the moment to sign up and you have instant business.

There also is an argument that as search engines take a little while to list your website it is better to have something up sooner rather than later. Just make sure it is worth visiting. You don't want to turn off potential customers because your rushed your website.

 

[edmondscommerce]

First thing you should do is get the domain live..

even with a single page with a keyword rich h1 tag and some coming soon blurb...

then yes - get the link building started

SEO takes time - get the clock ticking ASAP

 

[ecenica]

Agree with edmondscommerce advice.

A simple placeholder/coming soon page is a good way of laying the foundations for your full site.

 

[canvasdomain]

get it up and running online as soon as possible, just dont use 'under construction' links, texts or banners on you webpages, while you working on your site its getting seen, get an xml sitemap, register with google and submit the map,

DO IT NOW!!

 

[ScottNelson&Co]

Thank you for the advice everyone. I'll put together a keyword rich "coming soon" page for now.

Can anyone recommend a newsletter sign up form?

Thanks again for all your help.

 

[edmondscommerce]

Depends on what you want to do, email form or something more powerful / integrated?

How will you be sending your newsletter?

 

[ScottNelson&Co]

something basic in email form. It's not going to be complex and I don't expect a huge amount of traffic or people signing up. Thanks.

 

[edmondscommerce]

something like this one then

http://green-beast.com/gbcf-v3/

 

[ScottNelson&Co]

thanks Joseph. Looks like pretty straight forward.