A Redesigned and Refocused CareerPivot after Attack - Career Pivot

A Redesigned and Refocused CareerPivot after Attack - Career Pivot A Redesigned and Refocused CareerPivot A new redesigned and refocused CareerPivot website has been launched. There were multiple impetuses that caused this to happen but the primary one was that the website was attacked. This was not something like a denial of service attack (DoS)which is most commonly associated with a website attack. Someone went about generating thousands of spammy links to CareerPivot.com which had the aftereffect of generating a similar amount of broken links on the website. This caused search traffic to the website to decline significantly. I was informed of the issue by Elijah-Blue Vieau who wrote a guest post calledHow to Keep Your Mind Sharp As You Get Older. The company the Elijah-Blue worked for was rebranding and wanted to change the link in his bio on the post. Elijah-Blue is an SEO manager and guru; he explained that he had looked at my website on ahrefs.com and saw a rapid build-up of links from less than reputable websites. He did not have the time to help me but pointed me off to some resources. It is noteworthy that Elijah-Blue did not have to do this. I have found over the last 8 years that people who get involved with the CareerPivot cause (and yes, I think of it as a cause) have big hearts. This explained why traffic was declining for the first time since the inception of the website. I was forced into seeking help on how to remedy the situation. I believe I know who did this but will not say publically as I would never be able to prove it. It was also time for a redesigned and refocused CareerPivot website. Why a Redesigned and Refocused Website The original website was launched in February of 2012 with a target audience of baby boomer job seekers. I had just bought an iPhone and mobile-optimized websites were not common. The website received a makeover in 2016 using a WordPress responsive theme. This means the website would determine when the user was on a mobile device and format the page for that device. It was not a perfect implementation but good enough. Desktop traffic dwarfed traffic coming from mobile devices because the audience was primarily over 50. Over the last 3 years, mobile devices have become bigger with higher resolution screens, and those of us in the 2nd half of life have gotten better at using them. Traffic to careerpivot.com is now evenly split between mobile and desktop users. It was time for a redesign. Why a Refocused Website When I started CareerPivot, we were coming out of the depths of the recession and most of my audience just needed to go back to work. They needed to find a job to put food on the table, pay the mortgage and stock money away for retirement, which was looking further and further away. Listen to the most recent episode In 2019, the economy is booming but things are not so hot for baby boomers and their careers. I have written multiple articles about health insurance, ageism, and how many have been left behind by this economy. Check out the following: The Looming Healthcare and Insurance Catastrophe for Baby Boomers Ageism â€" What It Is, How to Identify It and What to Do About It Baby Boomers, How is the Economy Working for You? It is no longer about finding jobs, but rather about earning a living that can take many forms. For many who have crossed the magic age of 60, finding full-time employment at our previous level of compensation is nearly impossible. If you have not read the ProPublica article If You’re Over 50, Chances Are the Decision to Leave a Job Won’t be Yours please read it now. Because of this, the website is now refocused on how we plan and execute a career strategy that probably keeps us working into our 70s. For some of us this will be due to financial need, while for others it will be because we want to keep working. In either case, our careers will pivot and will not look like as they did in the first half of life. CareerPivot Community Will Soon Launch The CareerPivot Membership Community has been gestating for the last 2 years and is almost ready to be launched. This has not been an easy endeavor because in general the older we are the less likely we will share online, even in a private online community. The smallest demographic on Facebook is men over 50, and even of those who are on this platform, many do not actively participate. I have been learning from the 120 members who have come through the community over the last 2 years. I am not the first to try this. AARP launched the Life Reimagined in 2014 only to kill it in 2017 after 3 redesigns. I watched their effort closely; initially, it was completely online and the drop-off rate after sign on was precipitous. Virtually no one completed the program. They later worked on adding life coaches to the mix that would help in-person but that proved to be difficult to scale to the millions in their audience. I launched with no website in December of 2017 and 12 members. I ran focus groups over Zoom video conferencing tools that run on users’ computers, smartphones, and tablets. To put it bluntly, it is braindead simple. I have spent the last couple of years working on how to develop a real community with real relationships for people in the 2nd half of life, where they can get help and share their experiences. This is all at a very reasonable price because many of us have a very lean budget. I am not there yet, but I am getting close. The Community will formally launch in the first quarter of 2020. The website is heavily focused on how we will make our future into what we want and not what we have always done. What Do You Think? The website will continue to be worked on through the holiday season. I annually run a website audit looking at every page and post on the website. There are over 600 posts and almost 100 pages. Both the blog posts and the Repurpose Your Career podcast show notes are categorized to help you find the content you need. I will work on evaluating and improving navigation in the coming months. Look for a website and podcast surveys in January of 2020. This website will always be a work in progress to meet the needs of those of us who are in the 2nd half of life. A special thanks to the Standard Beagle web design team for making this happen. Comment below with what you think! Marc Miller Like what you just read? Share it with your friends using the buttons above. Like What You Read? Get Career Pivot Insights! Check out the Repurpose Your Career Podcast Do You Need Help With ...