In conversations with current and future clients, and other St. Louis digital marketers, I often am heard speaking about how one of the worst things you can do is ignore your website. “If you can’t keep up with your blog, don’t have one,” I often say. “Don’t let someone go to your blog and see you haven’t put up a new one since, say, July of 2018!”
People searching are sophisticated enough to smell a stale website at first click. Those that never switch out their images, are touting projects that are two years old – and look! This one isn’t even optimized. [Eye-roll]
A while back I got to help a digital marketer who specializes in websites here in town update their website a bit. It was overdue. I commented on the irony of that and he chuckled, shook his head, and said, “I’m my own worst client.”
Well that’s me.
I’ve known for years my site needed a complete make-over, and last year even contracted with a professional to do it. But fun, exciting projects kept coming my way. So I would work on other’s websites, digital content, articles, blogs, and special projects … but that KevinMMitchell.com looked a little longer in the tooth with each passing day kept gnawing on me.
Then the pandemic.
My biggest client serves the live event touring industry … so do the math on that. A couple of my smaller clients understandably hit the pause button. So I started the process. And boy, was it a lot of work. I imagine it’s like how you think you’re going to clean out your garage and you put it off year after year, and then when you finally do it, it takes you infinity. (I say “imagine” because not cleaning out my garage is also something I’m doing – and with great skill.)
It was a process I enjoyed. It was interesting to go through all my files and look back. I had forgotten I had done something fun and cool, like the Let’s Dance Quiz. It also slipped my mind that prior to the pandemic I had just started a relationship with Where magazine, which one finds in the hotel rooms of all the major cities.
When I did have the content ready, I contacted the woman that I had set up to do it. I opened with a “I know it’s been 12 months since we last had an exchange, but I’m ready now.” Well – she had gotten out of the business. But I found another great team, and the real work finally started happening.
But then that stalled because … well I suddenly was getting a lot of new work. But I put in some extra hours, and finally here it is: the new KevinMMitchell.com.
When I first did the website, so much of my work was writing for magazines. I still do that, and still get the occasional call from publications to write for them. I love it. But I also love how the trends have taken me into new areas: I ghost write blogs, I run company’s social media, I do unusual projects. Also I’ve been working with other creative agencies which I really enjoy. That call often starts with, “we thought we could do this but it’s kinda weird so … can you do it?”
Yes. Love to.
Of course I’m not done with just the site. I will heed my own advice and get back into blogging again. A good friend and creative who I do a lot of fun work with, Susy of Busy Bee Studios, pointed out that I could update the dates of the old blogs. I said no. I will leave that huge two-year gab up there as a reminder to be as good at serving my own needs as I am serving yours.
