Is your website accumulating a “technical debt”? How to prevent it from ending up costing you more than your business earns.

Is your website accumulating a “technical debt”? How to prevent it from ending up costing you more than your business earns.

In the world of software development, the concept of technical debt is well known: it refers to quick or suboptimal decisions that are made to get out of the way or to solve emergencies or quick needs and that, over time, generate maintenance costs, scalability problems or even operational blockages.

But what happens when we take this idea to a corporate website? At Apros, we have analyzed how many sites end up accumulating invisible technical debt: from unsupported plugins to unscalable or poorly thought out web architectures from the beginning or even making minor corrections to the website. And the problem is that this debt ends up being paid by your company.

What is technical debt and how does it originate on your website?

The term was introduced by Ward Cunningham, one of the creators of the Agile Manifesto, who compared it to a financial debt: you can get out of trouble now, but you will pay interest over time (Cunningham, 1992).

Applied to web development, technical debt can take many forms:

• Plugins that were installed “for speed” without evaluating weight or security.
  
• Pre-armed issues that limit SEO or UX in the long run.
  
• Failure to document site logic, making future improvements difficult.
  
• Architectures without version control, staging or testing.

In our experience we have seen that this debt is more common than it seems and can get bigger and bigger if we don’t do something about it.

Signs that your site is accumulating digital debt

• ⚠ Your website takes more than 5 seconds to load, especially on mobile.
  
• ⚠ Every new new functionality seems to “break” something else.
  
• ⚠ You can’t scale without redoing much of the site.
  
• ⚠ Changing the design takes weeks because everything is coupled together.
  
• ⚠ No one knows how the backend works because the original programmer left.
  

The true cost: time lost, reputation damaged

According to a Stripe and Harris Poll (2018) study, developers spend more than 33% of their time dealing with technical debt on digital projects. That not only impacts development costs, but also response time, innovation and user experience.

In digital business, this is critical: every extra second of loading reduces conversions and trust. Every site limitation reduces your ability to compete.

How to prevent technical debt on websites

1. Design with purpose, not in a hurry
   Not everything should be “ready for yesterday”. A solid architecture from the beginning avoids future problems.
   
2. Document everything
   Not only the code, but also strategic decisions, tools used and design criteria.
   
3. Avoid dependence on unnecessary plugins
   Every plugin is a potential time bomb. Use what you understand and can maintain.
   
4. Maintain staging and testing environments
   Don’t test in production. Never test in production.
   
5. Periodically audit
   Just as you do maintenance to a physical office, your website needs regular technical reviews.
   

The digital world is not static, and your website shouldn’t be either. At Apros we believe that a well-built site not only looks good today, but is ready to grow with you tomorrow.

Avoiding technical debt is not a fad: it is a long-term strategy to take care of your investment, your time and your reputation.

Sources:

• Cunningham, W. (1992). The WyCash Portfolio Management System. Wiki C2
  

Stripe & Harris Poll (2018). The Developer Coefficient Report. Stripe.com.

Technical debt on websites: the hidden cost of your site