Website Redesign: 6 Ways to Nail It This Time

  • June 20, 2019

A successful website redesign will have a positive and significant impact on the online brand of a company and on its bottom line. After all, you’re getting a fresh online presence, a sleeker user interface, and a website that is a lot more attractive than the competition’s.

Redesigning a website does not necessarily mean changing every single branding and graphic design element. With website redesign, you can edit its functionality to improve how your website works, and help you reach the goals you have set for your website.

Adopt a Content-First Approach to Website Redesign

A content-first approach to website redesign underscores the importance of content strategy, developing content that is persona-focused and site architecture at the beginning of the process, not the end. While it is tempting to begin with design first and figure out the content after, a content-first approach offers a better approach to website redesign. Completing a website before determining essential content to be added will lead to a wastage of money and time, and offset your strategy. Content after all is the main reason visitors come to your website. Redesign therefore should present our content in a user-friendly and meaningful way in addition to making your brand stand out and look great in the process. Therefore, structure your redesign around content instead of creating content for the design.

Build-In a Platform for Lead Generation and Business Development

Before now, B2B service company sites and other websites that weren’t commerce oriented acted as online brochures instead of revenue generators. A website should be a platform for directing thoughts and business development. Your redesign should take content marketing and lead generation into consideration to maximize the value of your web content. This means making use of the right website building techniques. You will also have to change the way you think about development and design, buying content and marketing strategy. The goal of your redesign should be more than to attract visitors in order to raise traffic; but establishing credibility, building thoughtful leadership and converting unknown visitors into real leads which can be nurtured.

Test the New Design Before, During and After Launch

It is important to test during your redesign. When you have more data at hand, you can make better decisions. Conduct 50/50 split tests where the old site design is shown to 50% of site visitors and the new site is shown to the other 50%. Testing the new design for your website will give you the confidence that you are not risking a better older interaction tool for a shinier model that deters users. Website redesign can be a lengthy and expensive process. You therefore need to ensure that your end product is the best it can be. Testing early and often in the redesign process will reveal flaws in your website and help you save money and time.

Plan for a Fully Responsive Website

In our multi-screen world, designing a website that functions optimally on almost all devices is important. Standard responsive design requires planning, testing and adapting as the process of design and development goes on. A full planned website redesign requires a large budget due to the added planning, design, development and testing required to ensure user experience is optimised on every device. It is an investment that creates value and should be seen as a cost. With a responsive redesign, your website is better positioned to meet the growing demands of users accessing content via mobiles and provide good user experience.

Identify the Goals and Priorities, Scope and Technical Requirements

Identifying the overarching goals of the redesign that will streamline the process. Have a clear picture of what the new design should look like and convey that to your web design team. Before getting started, define the specifics and scope to avoid a situation where you need to change course or adjust the scope significantly. A well defined scope and clear technical requirements will help you obtain a fair estimate from an agency. The technical requirements to decide on include how the website will function, how it will interact with other systems and with users, and the features and functionality it should have.

Begin Early – Website Redesign Takes Up More Time Than You Think

The last thing you want to do with your website redesign is to rush the redesign and encounter problems later. Even the most basic site can take months to complete from concept to launch. The redesign process is a long complicated and involves choosing a web design company, writing content, scheduling a photoshoot and getting the pictures developed. Your will also go through several beta designs to test and develop the new website to its full potential. For a great website redesign, invest the time to get all the steps properly done.

Why You Need a Website Redesign

We can not talk about design without mentioning the name of your website. If your domain name is not striking enough, chances are that visitors will not remember it let alone search for it. Start with a search for a domain that meets your redesign needs. Discount Domains and other similar companies make this easy.

A website redesign is not a walk in the park. Planning will take a lot of time and effort than you have anticipated, especially if you want to do it the right way and see positive results. Before redesigning your website you want to make a list of your reasons for a redesign. Having a clear outline of the reasons you are redesigning will give you clear goals and objectives. Here are some of reasons why a website redesign is necessary:

  • The purpose of your website has changed
  • Your website is not mobile-friendly
  • The Content Management System (CMS) or website technology is out of date
  • You want to incorporate a better content strategy
  • Your website is unresponsive
  • Website looks old and outdated
  • Outdated third-party tools
  • You are not getting the results you want

When redesigning your website it is important for you to follow a procedure that guarantees that the evaluation, planning, and execution of the redesign is smooth and painless whilst delivering the results you desire..

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