Tag: support

Launching a new website is exciting for any organization. After months of planning, preparation and hard work, your new site experience is ready for all of your users to enjoy. But here’s the truth that many organizations overlook: launch day is actually the first day of your project, not the finish line.

Websites are not static; they evolve and change as your organization grows and they need ongoing attention and refinement to remain effective. If you want your website to continue to engage your audience while evolving to meet your ongoing business goals, long-term support should be part of your website strategy from day one.

Support Is More Than Just Bug Fixes and Security Updates

Many people assume website support is just about keeping the lights on with bug fixes and security updates. While these are crucial to the ongoing health of your site, a comprehensive support strategy goes far beyond the basic upkeep required to keep your site online. A successful long-term support strategy should always include:

• Design Revisions: As design trends shift, your website should remain visually appealing and aligned with modern aesthetics.
• Information Architecture Adjustments: Content organization and structure should evolve based on user behavior and your business goals.
• UX and Navigation Enhancements: Making it easier for visitors to find what they need improves conversions and engagement.
• Performance Optimization: Ensuring fast load times and smooth interactions keeps users engaged and prevents bounce rates from climbing.
• Regular testing: Ensuring your site runs smoothly while identifying opportunities for further optimization.
• Conversion Optimization: Regularly check CTAs, forms and other conversion points to make sure they are driving conversions.
• Accessibility compliance is a moving target: Stay current on WCAG requirements and run frequent accessibility checks on your website. 

With a well-thought-out support plan, your website remains a valuable asset rather than slowly declining over time.

Consider The “Afters.” Where Will Your Website Be in 12 to 24 Months?

Is it still performing at its peak? Will your content still be relevant and easy to update? Will your navigation still make sense as your organization grows? Without ongoing support, websites can quickly become outdated, difficult to navigate, or misaligned with your current business objectives. If there’s one thing you can count on in the digital world, it’s change. Your website needs ongoing care and support in order to adapt accordingly. 

A well-maintained website not only stays fresh and engaging but also avoids the slow decline that plagues many neglected sites. Instead of scrambling to redesign an underperforming site every few years, ongoing support ensures continuous improvement and a fresh experience for users.

The Cost Benefits of Long-Term Support

Long-term website support can significantly extend the lifespan of your site, and reduce the need for costly redesigns every few years (we have one client whose site we’ve been maintaining for 10 years!). Instead of dealing with an expensive overhaul every three years, long-term support allows you to make strategic, iterative improvements over time. This spreads out costs, making it a more budget-friendly strategy while ensuring your website remains competitive and up to date. It also allows for the maintaining strong SEO performance and a positive user experience which means you won’t frustrate potential customers or advocates for your mission due to outdated design or functionality.

Your Website Deserves A Long-Term Strategy

If you’re considering redesigning your website, don’t just focus on launch day, think about what comes after. Partnering with an agency (shameless plug: like us) that offers long-term support ensures your website continues to work for you and remains relevant well into the future. Ongoing support is a cost-effective way for you to stay competitive, maximize your investment, and keep your website thriving—not just surviving.

Sometimes you need a few extra hands. 

When it comes to managing their digital presence, mission-driven organizations face unique challenges. Maintaining a strong website requires precision, collaboration, and expertise — from safeguarding data to ensuring accessibility and compliance with industry regulations.

For many teams, hiring an outside agency for a large website build can feel risky — especially if past experiences led to sites that didn’t meet their needs or felt disconnected from their mission. Their biggest fear is that they’ll end up with a site that’s built in a way their internal team won’t be able to edit, support, or extend on their own. 

To avoid these challenges, many organizations are turning to staff augmentation to get the support they need while retaining control of the process. It allows their internal teams to keep their autonomy while getting the extra help or expertise needed to get their website across the finish line.

How can staff augmentation help your website?

Instead of outsourcing an entire project, staff augmentation provides targeted support where it’s needed most — whether that’s design, development, accessibility, or ongoing maintenance.

It’s a model that offers some important benefits for teams, allowing them to:

• Maintain control over the vision and execution of your website.
• Boost team capacity to meet tight timelines or handle larger projects.
• Fill skills gaps with specialized expertise, like compliance with ADA accessibility standards, security needs, or HIPAA regulations.
• Collaborate seamlessly with professionals who integrate into your workflow without disrupting your team’s dynamic.

Here at Kanopi, we’ve been offering staff augmentation for years — often helping clients under pressure to deliver high-quality websites that serve users, staff, and stakeholders alike.

How we partner with organizations

Clients who partner with us for staff augmentation often prefer us to sign non-disclosure agreements, so we can’t share those specific case studies. However, we can list a few non-specific examples of ways we’ve supported clients and their in-house teams:

• Bringing expertise to fill gaps: A Fortune 50 company brought us in to strengthen their team with custom Drupal module development, secure API integration for PPI compliance, assist with designs, keep projects on track, meet deadlines, and maintain high-quality standards. 
• Collaborating under tight deadlines: When a hospital system’s in-house team was stretched thin during a major redesign, we stepped in to handle development work. We delivered on time while staying aligned with the team’s goals.
• Enhancing accessibility and compliance: A nonprofit provider required updates to ensure their site met both accessibility and HIPAA compliance standards. Our specialists joined their internal team to address gaps, ensuring the site was compliant, user-friendly, and patient-focused.

One example we can cite is the UCSF Department of Surgery. We partnered with their IT team to develop a template for 80+ sites, allowing each to feature unique content or share content across multiple domains.

Ready to enhance your team?

Even with a dedicated internal team, there are times when an extra set of hands — or a niche skillset — can make all the difference. If you need staff augmentation for your website, we’re here to collaborate with your team, helping you overcome resource challenges and build a website that meets both your current and future goals.

Let’s create something amazing together. Contact us if your latest project could use consulting services or helping hands within our full spectrum of web services.