Gone are the days when the Internet would run on auto-pilot with thousands of surfers checking out the web out of sheer curiosity. There was a time not too long ago when Yahoo celebrated the indexing of its 100 millionth page. Today, the number of pages Google has indexed has touched one trillion. Web traffic doubles every two years and commerce transactions on the Internet have crossed the one billion mark. Since your website is perhaps your most important business asset, tuning it regularly, especially when you anticipate a significant increase in website traffic, is a mission worth pursuing. Here are five things you should consider doing right away if you haven’t done so already in order to keep your website humming during the upcoming holiday shopping season.

Check your Links
Check to make sure that all your links that link one page of your website to another are up and running. Google and the other major search engines use this internal linking pattern to index your website and perform what is referred to as a “deep crawl.” This is very important for front page search engine positioning which is also determined to a certain extent by the stability of your external links. Use the services of your web master, a link checking software program or a SEO consultant to accomplish this critical check. We recommend that you consider pursuing a regular site maintenance program in which you can check your link stability once every six months.

Bandwidth Challenges
Have you ever experienced difficulty in accessing a website because it has exceeded its bandwidth? This happens when too many visitors try to access the server on which your site is located. Check with your hosting company well in advance to make sure that their servers have enough band width to manage peaks in website traffic during the holiday shopping escapades.

Functional Payment System
If your website engages in Internet commerce, markets products and services, and uses payment gateways to process payment transactions, it is well worth your while to conduct a dry run of your entire system in anticipation of the upcoming holiday rush. Conduct live transactions in small amounts and verify the various payments systems you have deployed for this purpose. As a side bar, this test will also conduct an analysis of your shopping cart software and ensure that your customers will be engaged in a positive online experience when shopping at your website.

Accurate and Updated Product Descriptions
Finally, read your website copy and check it thoroughly to make sure that it conforms to your product offerings. Inaccurate and incomplete product descriptions on your website can mislead your customers and create difficulties later.

It is best to resolve technical issues pertaining to your website well in advance of any potential problems. Put the systems and checks in place and experience a snag free holiday shopping season.