In the age of technological development and the growing demand for fast-operating websites, business owners can not fall behind the market’s requirements. The website is the main asset that showcases your brand and builds trust with leads and future clients. To stay competitive, it’s crucial that it meets and exceeds your competitors’ standards. That’s where website redesign comes in.
In a nutshell, a website redesign is a structural update that targets the layout, functionality, and content of your website. The goal is to create an updated, efficient website that brings more traffic and, thus, revenue to your company. In this article, we will cover everything you want to know about the website redesign process.
This article will help you:
- Know when the right time to redesign the website is.
- Understand the benefits of a website redesign.
- Find out the steps of a website redesign.
- Discover answers to the most common questions on the topic.
When Is It Time To Redesign Your Website
We understand that running a business in a modern online world can make you want to jump into every new trend to get more customers and sales. But before diving in, it’s important to think through your business’s specific needs and how they can be solved.
Let’s take a closer look at the most common signs your website is not performing well:
- Outdated design: Your website is the face of your business. If it lacks engagement, clear navigation, or trust signals (for example, reviews, case studies, trust seals, or certifications), visitors may choose a competitor’s site.
- No longer reflects your brand/services/products: If your website content is outdated and no longer aligns with your current offerings, it’s time to redesign.
- Low conversions or not meeting business goals: Tracking your website analytics is crucial to ensuring its performance. If your website isn’t driving results, namely leads or sales, or reaching the right audience, it may be time to reassess its effectiveness in achieving your business objectives.
- Slow loading speed: Users’ expectations for quick website operation have skyrocketed in the past decade. If your website loads as fast as the first smartphone, the chance customers will wait for it is close to zero. Many free speed test tools can show you real-time results for your website speed.
- Difficult navigation: Your website’s layout should be logical, taking into account the next steps you want the customer to take. Easy-to-use navigation is essential for guiding visitors to what they need.
- Not mobile-responsive: According to Semrush’s analytical comparison of mobile vs. computer website visits in 2023, 313% more users visited website pages on mobile than desktop. This gives an eye-opening understanding of the demand for mobile-responsive website pages. Your website must load quickly and display images and layout correctly on small screens.
- Technical errors: Issues like 404 errors (broken pages) negatively impact user experience and can drive visitors away.
- Competitors have better sites: Look at the highest-ranking websites for your industry or business. If your competitors’ websites are more user-friendly, visually appealing, and rank higher, it’s a sign that your site may be lagging behind.
- Your business is rebranding: A redesign is often necessary to ensure your website aligns with your new business strategy and target audience. Changing the website can help you resonate with that audience better and ensure your rebranding efforts are successful.
Benefits of a Website Redesign
After analyzing your website, you may have noticed some of the issues we’ve discussed. Now, you might be wondering, ‘How can a website redesign solve these problems?’ In this section, we’ll explore the key benefits of a website redesign and how it can help your business.
Increase traffic and generate more leads
Increasing traffic to your website is a process that entails a number of steps, and website redesign is one of them. Creating compelling page layouts with clear calls to action (for example, Call Us Today, Shop Now, Sign Up Here, etc.) helps visitors stay on your website longer and be guided to the right action you want them to take. It will help you retain more customers and show Google that your website is worth visiting and, thus, worth showing to more people for relevant searches.
Boost brand identity and visibility
A website redesign will create a fresh face for your brand. Is your brand striving to be the leader in its field? Then, let your website be represented by high-tech features and layout. Is your brand focused on winning the trust of clients? Then, let your website offer a welcoming, personalized experience to invoke trust for your services. All that to say, redesigning your website allows you to create a new identity for your business and help your website stand out to users.
Enhance user experience and satisfaction
Fixing the core operational issues of your website will ensure satisfaction from users who don’t find broken links or 404 pages or have to waste time looking where the contact button is. Fixing these issues can boost user experience and make more visitors stay around to browse your website.
Improve Advertising results
Many businesses overlook how website performance impacts online advertising. You can increase your ad budget and create great campaigns, but they’ll fall short if your website doesn’t deliver on what the ad promises.
For example, Google measures multiple aspects of your website to see whether it is worth showing your ad for search keywords. Issues like slow page load speed, poor user experience, and lack of relevant keywords can hurt your ad performance. Website redesign can address these issues and ensure your advertising efforts are supported by a great first impression of your website pages.
Get better SEO performance
Incorporating SEO into your website redesign is crucial. By focusing on SEO during the redesign process, you can implement best practices directly into your site’s structure. This includes improving loading times, updating title tags and meta descriptions, adding a blog page, and refining website architecture. Understanding your SEO strategy before starting the redesign can significantly boost its effectiveness and success.
Steps Involved In The Redesign Process
Now that we have discussed website redesign and how it can benefit a business, it is important to outline what to expect if you embark on the journey of redesigning a website.
- Determine your goals: Ensure your goal is not simply a good-looking website. Know why you want a redesign and what you expect to achieve from it. Think about what new structure your website may need. Determine whether your website is only focused on leads or needs e-commerce features. Do you have a single-page website? Then, consider expanding your website pages for better future performance.
- Prepare your team or reach out to a professional for an initial consultation: Whether you plan on carrying out the redesign yourself or hiring a developer, it is important to discuss the details of a redesign and the expected timeline to ensure everyone is on the same page. If you decide to hire an agency for your website redesign, take the time to ensure they are the right fit for your project by reviewing their client feedback and taking a look at their portfolio of previous redesigns.
- Prioritize your content: When choosing the perfect visuals and color scheme, remember that even the best-looking websites need high-quality content to perform well. The best tip is to focus on the content first, not the design. Know what content performs best on your website by checking your analytics and work around that content in your redesign project.
- Research & Planning: This step sets the course for your redesign. Choose the right website redesign tool or explore the specifics of a custom-built site. Take the time to research essential SEO practices for your redesign and identify which design strategies are most effective in your industry.
- Design & Development: Now is the time for hands-on work on your website pages, creating layouts, thinking through structure, and achieving the desired outcome. It also includes fixing issues that were present and developing a responsive design for mobile and other devices.
- Migration: One of the more technical steps of the redesign is migrating the information from your current website to a new Content Management System (CMS), like WordPress or Shopify. If properly carried out, this step will allow people to see your new website pages when they search for the previous content you had, ensure that unnecessary pages are deleted, and help search engines find the new content quicker. Choosing a knowledgeable website redesigner is vital to avoid issues like failing to set up proper redirects or notifying Google of your new site. Such mistakes can undo years of marketing efforts and severely impact your search engine visibility.
- Testing: Conducting A/B testing in content redesign is important for determining which page designs work better. This will help you know what users prefer and will be more drawn to when you launch a website.
- Launch: The final stage of a website redesign is launching the new website. This stage starts your patient observation of the performance and analytics to ensure the changes made were successful. It’s crucial to have proper tracking in place to effectively evaluate the new website’s performance and see new areas of growth.
Things to Consider: A Quick FAQ
1. What Is The Average Timeline For A Complete Website Redesign?
The timeline for a website redesign depends heavily on the scale of the project. It can range anywhere from a few weeks to a few months.
2. What Is The Cost Of Redesigning A Website?
Similar to the timeline, the cost can vary depending on the number of pages your website has and what features you want to add to your new design. The average cost of hiring a web developer would start at around $2000 and reach as much as $70,000. For example, here at Zima Media, the starting price for a redesign is $1,500.
3. Does A Website Redesign Affect SEO?
A website redesign can directly affect your SEO. A poorly conducted redesign can lower your website traffic and even destroy your previous efforts in SEO. That is why it is important to hire an experienced professional who will implement proper SEO practices into the redesign and ensure your website experiences growth and does not decline after the launch.
4. Is It Better To Get A Custom-Built Website Or Use Website-Building Tools?
Both custom websites and website-building tools have strengths and weaknesses, and the choice rests on your vision for your website. Some features correlate between the two types of website builds, such as security, functionality, and performance. However, there are some considerable differences that may draw you to one or the other.
If you prefer a unique design with features that website-building tools can’t provide, then a custom-built website is the right fit for you. Some businesses may require specific tools that regular website-building templates are not able to provide. However, custom-built websites are way more expensive, take longer to create, and require either web development skills or a recurrent need to hire a professional for maintenance and updates.
If your website does not require unique features, then website-building tools like WordPress or Shopify are the right choice. Among the most liked features of website-building tools are ease of scalability for e-commerce websites, the ability to update pages and upload new content with minimal knowledge of the system, and cheaper website building and redesign costs. Website-building tools are also the best choice for small businesses in terms of setup and maintenance costs.
5. Should You Handle It Internally Or Hire An Agency?
To help you decide whether it is worth redesigning a website yourself, let’s quickly review the pros and cons.
Pros of redesigning a website yourself:
- Cheaper costs: Using a website-building tool requires minimal fees, saving your business money.
- You have full control over the process. You handle every step, and as your skills improve, you can learn to maintain the site yourself.
Cons of redesigning a website yourself:
- Time required: A professional developer may take a few months to redesign a site; depending on the complexity. Doing it yourself, however, could extend the deadline up to a year depending how much time you are able to put into it from your daily work requirements.
- Mistakes are possible: Redesigning can impact your SEO and other marketing efforts, requiring careful execution. Lack of experience increases the risk of errors.
So, overall, the safest choice when it comes to website redesign is hiring a trusted website redesign agency, which will ensure that the best practices are implemented and that a great result is produced in a timely manner.
Prepare for Your Website Project
Does a website redesign seem like the right next step for your business? Don’t waste your time trying to find the right website developer. Zima Media team is here and ready to help you reach your marketing goals.
We are a professional marketing agency that has helped many businesses grow by creating new websites and redesigning old ones in WordPress and Shopify. Let us create a functional, unique website that perfectly represents your brand. Contact us today and take the first step toward transforming your online presence!
