9 Quick Wins to Prepare Your Digital Presence for the New Year
The end of the year brings “big vision” energy, new strategies, new content, and new momentum. But the truth is, none of that lands well if your foundations aren’t steady. December is the perfect moment to pause, regroup, and revisit the things that quietly impact your entire year but rarely get prioritized.
These aren’t the flashy tasks or the big-picture goals. They’re the behind-the-scenes details that keep your systems organized, your communications aligned, and your team ready to hit the ground running on day one.
Here are the small-but-mighty details to cross off the list before January arrives.
1. Clean up user permissions.
If there’s one item you shouldn’t skip, it’s this one. Over the course of a year, people join your team, shift roles, or move on — and your systems don’t always reflect those changes. Before stepping into the new year, take time to review who has access to what across all your platforms: social media accounts, scheduling tools, analytics dashboards, ad accounts, project management systems, file storage, folders/documents, and anything else that touches your work.
Remove former employees or contractors who no longer need access, update permission levels for team members whose responsibilities have changed, and confirm that everyone currently on staff has the appropriate logins. This is also a great moment to enable two-factor authentication if you haven’t already, or to update passwords that haven’t been touched in a while.
2. Double-check your Instagram preview sizing.
Instagram’s post ratios seem to change every time you blink, which means something that looks perfect in the full post view might still get awkwardly cropped in the grid.
Take a moment to review how your recent posts appear on your profile, especially graphics with text near the edges. If anything important is getting cut off, adjust your templates or safe-zone margins so the core content stays centered and protected, no matter what ratio Instagram currently favors.
3. Make sure your social media bios are aligned and up-to-date.
Your bios are often the very first impression someone gets of your organization, yet they’re one of the easiest things to forget about. Take a moment to review every platform you’re active on and make sure your mission statement, tone, and key details match across the board. Check for outdated language, old links, or calls to action that no longer apply. If your brand voice has evolved this year, your bios should reflect that, too.
This is also a good time to make sure each platform’s bio is optimized for its format: short and direct on Instagram, slightly more descriptive on LinkedIn, link-first on X, etc. A quick audit now can make your profiles feel polished and consistent heading into the new year.
4. Audit and test every contact touchpoint.
It’s surprisingly easy for contact channels to break without anyone noticing. Maybe a form integration disconnected during an update; maybe an inbox is forwarding to a team member who left months ago; or maybe a QR code now leads to a page that’s been archived. Before the new year, run a full audit of every single way someone might try to reach you.
Make sure each pathway actually works (submissions should land in the right inbox, integrations should still be connected, and links should point to live pages). Then audit the auto-responses tied to each one: out-of-office replies, confirmation emails, welcome sequences, donation receipts, pop-ups, and social media away messages. Update any outdated language, incorrect links, or off-brand tone.
5. Update your website favicon.
It’s one of the smallest elements of your entire brand (literally), but it shows up everywhere: in browser tabs, bookmarks, mobile searches, and more. The end of the year is a perfect time to double-check that your favicon is updated, high-resolution, and sized correctly across devices.
If it’s been a while, you might be surprised by how many different favicon formats and dimensions are recommended today, so a quick refresh using a trusted sizing guide can make a big difference in polish and consistency.
6. Align your team’s email signatures.
Email signatures are a small detail, but they’re one of the most consistently visible pieces of your brand. Before the new year begins, give your entire team’s signatures a quick look to ensure they’re on-brand, accurate, and consistent.
Update logos to the most current version, confirm all URLs are correct, and make sure pronouns and titles are up to date.
7. Organize your design + asset folders.
A clean, well-organized asset library saves hours of digging during busy seasons — and ensures every piece of content you publish looks polished and on-brand from the start.
Archive old or completed project folders in Canva, Google Drive, Dropbox, or wherever your team stores assets. Remove outdated logos, graphics, and templates so no one accidentally uses the wrong version in January. Consolidate duplicates, clearly label folders, and make sure your brand assets (logos, color codes, templates, photo libraries) are easy to find and consistently named.
8. Check how your organization appears in Google Business Profile.
Give your online presence a quick tune-up: update your Google Business Profile with the correct address, contact info, hours, and photos; skim your Google search results for outdated descriptions or broken links; and check how your organization shows up in AI Overviews. If AI tools surface old or inaccurate info, refresh the copy on your About page, program pages, or FAQs so they can pull cleaner, more accurate summaries.
9. Review your tech stack and subscriptions.
As the year wraps up, it’s the perfect time to take stock of every tool, platform, and subscription your organization relies on. Tech stacks tend to grow quietly — a free trial here, an upgraded plan there, a tool you needed for one project but never revisited. Those small additions can add up to unnecessary costs and clutter.
Review each tool your team is using and ask:
Do we still need this?
Is this the right tier or plan?
Are we paying for seats no one is using?
Is there overlap between tools that could be consolidated?
Remove anything that’s no longer relevant, downgrade plans you aren’t fully using, and make sure the tools you keep actually support the goals and capacity you have going into the new year. A quick subscription audit can save money, reduce digital clutter, and give your team a much clearer picture of the systems that truly matter.
A little end-of-year cleanup goes a long way. These tasks may be small, but they set the tone for everything you build in the months ahead. With a few intentional tweaks now, your team can walk into January feeling organized, aligned, and ready for whatever the new year brings.