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From a business perspective, the start of the New Year often generates excitement over being able to make a fresh start, with a new budget and a new set of goals.

Don't forget to add to your list of New Year's resolutions a commitment to review and update your web site so that it can contribute to your success strategy for 2008.

Check these areas to make sure they are still accurate:

1. Corporate address, email address and phone number
2. Product information and list of services
3. Any references to staff members or email addresses
4. Facilities and equipment lists
5. Images - look for old facilities, discontinued products and former employees
6. Tagline or motto
7. Contact form - are the qualifying questions still pertinent?
8. Submit the form. Does it go to the right person?

Other areas that might need attention:

Web Site Design

1. Over time, the design can begin to look dated. Determine whether it's time to freshen up the look and feel.
2. If your design is several years old, it's important to see whether it works properly in newer browsers that have been launched since the time you designed the site.
3. Review the download time of your pages. If you've added flash elements or large graphics, it could bog down loading time, which will scare away some visitors with slower connection speeds.

Coding

1. Check for programming errors or outdated programming.
2. If you're using CSS, verify that the site works on all browsers.
3. Check Google and Yahoo to see how many of your pages have been indexed. If there are pages missing, it could indicate coding obstacles that prevent the search engines from indexing the site.
4. Review your meta tags and make sure you have unique title, description and keyword tags on all your pages.
5. Verify that all the navigation links on your site are working properly and go to active pages.

Content

1. Realistically, if your company depends on the web site for lead generation, then regular attention should be paid to adding new content or updating existing content. Search engines are able to index a host of new content types that a few years ago wasn't possible. That makes content like videos, images and PDFs much more valuable to your site.
2. Update the site map. Make sure all the pages you want to be indexed and found are linked on the physical map on your web site as well as in your Google SiteMap.
3. If you haven't done much with your site in the last year or two, chances are it's not performing as well on search engines as it could. Getting positioned on the search engines first and foremost is a function of how well the content on your matches search engine user searches. Update your content and add new content to make your site more relevant.

Search Engine Optimization

1. Review your site's position on major search engines for the primary keywords that site visitors would use to find your site. If your competitors are ahead of you or your site is not on the first 3 pages, it's time to make some site changes to improve your position.
2. Review the keywords that are used on your site to make sure they are still relevant to your business and that they focus on the terms most people would likely use to find your site.
3. Do some research to determine whether the keywords you use on the site are the most popular terms by which searchers use to locate businesses like yours. Then compare that to how you've written your content and coded your meta tags. Add new content to focus on the most important keywords.
4. If your links to strategic partners or other third-party sites, verify that the links on your site still work. At the same time, you should verify that sites that have made reciprocal link agreements with you are still honoring that commitment and that those links still work.
5. Develop a plan to generate additional external links to your site.
6. Consider how you might leverage content to increase traffic and links to your site. Look for opportunities to post articles or white papers on third-party sites with a link back to your site.

Miscellaneous

New sites, new technologies continue to enter the marketplace that can be used to further enhance the visibility of your site online. Take some time to investigate how your competitors are using social media to expand their visibility and consider whether your company can use it as well.

Similarly, the search engines continue to buy or build new features that can be put to use to make your site more prominent. Take a look at Google Base, Google Maps, videos through YouTube (now owned by Google), etc. Consider whether your site offers content that would be relevant for these types of searches.

The time spent to review and update will be well-spent. Even if you find there's little to change right now, you'll be assured that your site is still performing on the search engines and that site visitors can respond the way you intended.

Angela Charles is president of Pilot Fish, an Akron, Ohio web design and search engine optimization firm that specializes in business-to-business web sites.