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Why Consider a Website Redesign – Tips and Recommendations

04 Dec 2020


Did you know that a well-designed user interface (UI) can boost your website conversion rate by 200%, while a better user experience (UX) design can increase conversion rate by 400%?

Your website is the identity of your business and the heart of your digital marketing campaign.

 

Unfortunately, UI/UX alone never persuades business owners to consider redesigning their websites. What puzzles even more, is they know the fact that content with interactive elements attracts more users.


But yes, there are plenty of reasons to do it. It may be the outdated technology, old design, implementation of new ideas to achieve new goals, and many other reasons that you want to revamp your website. But the ultimate goal of website design is to enable users to move about pages quickly when they access your website. That means usefulness should prevail over beauty.

Therefore, if you are considering redesigning your website, then don’t just rush to the designers. You have something uniquely essential to know here.

Interesting Facts about Website Design

  • 100 ms delay in page load decreases conversion by 7%
  • 7 seconds delay in page load irritate 33% of visitors
  • 94% of the first impression comes from websites design
  • com recorded a 35% jump in revenue after web design implementation
  • 88% of customers never return to the website they leave due to a bad experience
  • PWA can result in a 136% increase in User engagement and 52% in conversions

The given data suggest that website design is a constant element. You can design your website once and use it for a lifetime. Now, let’s move to the next segment of this article.

What is Website Design

A website design refers to the look that is displayed on the internet, while redesign refers to the changes made in the code, content, structure, and visuals of a website to make it more useful to users. In a simple sentence, website design is a complete overhaul in presentation —the way it looks and interacts with users.

 

Now again, don’t get confused with website design and website refresh terms. They are different. The former deals with a complete overhaul of the website, while the latter deals with a lighter lift —modifying the existing structure. A website redesign is a choice when there are some broader aspects to fulfill. For example, if you want to boost revenue, lower bounce rates, increase user engagement, improve user experience, and to name a few, then redesigning is the way to achieve that goal.

 

However, if there are smaller changes, such as logo, new additions, work outdated or promotional content, etc., then content optimization with frequent refreshes can be enough. Nevertheless, we are here to talk about the website redesign, and we’ll stick with only that part in this article.

Benefits of Website Redesign


We have already discussed that we redesign our websites for many different reasons. It can be one kind of investment to ensure a better future for the business. Yes, you get loads of benefits in return. Let’s take a look at some of the top ones.

 

Redesigning your website leverages your website with:

  • New and updated technology
  • Higher engagement
  • Higher conversions
  • Increased sales
  • Customer trust
  • Increased SEO rankings
  • Reduced costs
  • Faster page speed/loading time
  • Easy navigation
  • Appealing website
  • Make website responsive
  • Accessibility across all devices

 

Does your Website Need a Redesign?

Your website is the face of your business, and you would want it to look perfect. You can consider redesigning when you feel to transform it. However, if your website struggles with any of the issues given below, then redesigning is necessary.

Answer these questions, and you will know if your website needs a redesign.

  • Is your website design old?
  • Doesn’t meet your expectations?
  • Are conversions down?
  • Is your website slow?
  • Is your website not responsive?
  • Are third-party tools outdated?
  • Need to improve content strategy?
  • Is it affecting your credibility?
  • Are there some broken links?
  • The issue of communication with customers?

If your answer is “Yes,” then your website needs a complete overhaul. 

Tips to Redesign your Website - what works?

Your website enables your business to be visible and 24/7/365 accessible to your customers. Many things matter, though the first impression is something that counts.

 

So, what makes a positive first impression? In online business, the year 2021 will be for the website that is mobile-friendly, has easy navigation, visible contact information, and name a few.

- Draft goal

Before you begin redesigning your website, ask yourself a few questions. Where to start? How to ensure that redesigning your website will eradicate all issues and bring more users and leads? That is to say, plan in advance. Plan what you have to design. If you have gone through the paragraphs given above, you must be familiar with the issues you are facing with your website. It will help you plan where to start and how to achieve your design goal.

 

- Make a note of site improvement categories

Who are you designing your website for? That’s a significant question to ask before redesigning your website. When you get the answer to this question, it will be easy to focus on the following things;

Branding: Your website logo should clearly reflect your business. If you have a business logo, ensure that the same logo is there on the website. If you don’t have a logo on your website, get a nice with your design and creative team right away. 

Targeting: If you know your target audience and demographic, then your website style must reflect your target market's choice. 

 

Visual elements: Research to know what attracts your users more in particular regions (demographic context). Make a note and ensure the changes are made accordingly, be it selecting images, graphical elements, and page layout. 

 

Navigation: Navigation is an essential part of your website redesign process. Create a significant user journey through each page. Check whether users can navigate, find products they look for, quickly check out, and make payments. 

 

To save time, you must draft what you want to redesign, for what purposes. Decide whether you want to redesign the look, performance, or standard. 

- Select technology 

If you want structural changes in your website, select a technology that fits your website requirement. For your tech stack, you would want to choose a functional language that delivers results. Understand the technology you want to use, compare it with other similar languages, and then decide which one fits your requirement.  

 

- Document and save all current metrics

You can write down and save the current metrics data in a spreadsheet. Take a note of data like:

  • Bounce rate
  • Average time on page
  • 1st traffic source
  • 2nd traffic source
  • 3rd traffic source
  • Conversion rate

 

- Back up your website

You can take a backup of the most recent version of your website in the beginning so that you wouldn’t require any backend SEO work. 

Besides, you can also back up the contents on the page. For example;

  • Blog contents 
  • Page texts 
  • Videos 
  • Downloadable reports
  • PDF files 
  • Whitepaper 
  • Etc. 

 

Now, let’s get to the tips for a website redesign. We’ve covered everything in the website redesigning tips to help you make your website appealing, enhance the user experience, and earn useful leads. 


Things to Consider while Redesigning your Website

 

1. Website speed/Page loading time 

Lower page time can have a direct impact on revenue. Usually, people don’t like to wait for anything while this goes to an extreme level in the digital world. Your web page should not take more than 2 seconds to load 47% of consumers expect that. More than that, if your website takes more than 7 seconds to load, you are supposed to miss 33% of your potential customers. 

 

Check your website page speed and work accordingly and figure out what keeps your website slow. 

2. Mobile responsiveness

Did you know that 79% of smartphone users made online purchases using their smartphones in the last 6 months of 2019? When you redesign your website, make sure that the website meets the modern customers' needs. 


Most importantly, Google loves mobile-friendly websites as it announced mobile-first indexing in 2018. Even though it will have no impact on ranking, Google will choose an AMP page first when encountered with AMP and non-AMP pages together. So, consider this tip as the significant one when redesigning your website. 

 

3. Website optimization

No doubt, you may be aware of website optimization, and you may have been following it as well. However, we are suggesting to add even more optimization —we mean conversion rate optimization. 

 

Conversion rate optimization (CRO), according to MOZ, refers to the systematic process of converting your website visitors into prospective buyers. Well, it does it by recognizing every move of costumes visiting your website. It can help you know how customers interact with your websites, such as how they move through the website, what action they take, what creates barriers for them to explore the website, and complete goals. You can understand this optimization more by exploring the internet. 

 

4. Consider adding web animation

Web animation is the latest hack of web design. It helps users serve purposes without affecting web page loading time. It will keep your customer engaged without letting them lose their patience. 

 

Today’s users don’t want to wait for the page (that takes time) to load and read long content. If you are wondering where to add animated videos, then you can add videos to every page, be it blogs, landing pages, service pages, product pages, or anything else. 

 

5. Keep SEO in mind 

Underestimating SEO will cost you millions. Everyone says that content is king, and it’s true as well. But, it’s entirely enough. Good content may attract users, but if it is not optimized, how will it reach your readers, clients, listeners, audiences, or spectators. In short, your content has to be optimized for both your readers and the search engines —browsers. 

61% of marketers follow SEO best practices to grow organic traffic and web presence. You can consider adding Robot Meta tags, which let search engines know how to present content in the search results. Don’t worry. The Robo meta tags are not visible to users, leaving its perfect effect on search engines. 

 

6. Flat design  

Gradients, highlights, and shadows are part of the 2.0 version of Flat design. It refers to a minimalistic approach to design, involving minimalist use of simple elements, typography, and flat colors. Let’s take a look at the logo of Google’s Chrome (given below). The two versions can help you understand what flat design 2.0 is. 

The flat design appeared in 2000, but it was full of graphic website elements. Then came 1.0 with the primary aim of providing the best user experience. Unfortunately, it failed to deliver during the primary approach that 1.0 created to redirect users to CTA couldn’t work. That’s when 2.0 came up with a better user experience and allows interface designs to be efficient and streamlined.

 

7. Split-screen content 

Website redesign with split-screen content is the trend that offers a lot of ease to your users. It helps users find the information they are looking for in less time. Besides, when you have more than just one idea to convey, why keep an uncluttered look? Leverage your website with splitting screen contents and let users make productive use of services and products. 

 

The split-screen design is continuously growing and evolving. People also love this design, and integrating this look will give your website an edge over those with no split-screen content. 


8. Testing and launching

Once the redesigning part is ready, wait before you make it live for customers. You still have one step left, and that is testing. Testing your website design before relaunching is as important as redesigning the website itself. You need to ensure that;

 

  • The website looks exactly the way it was planned 
  • It functions as expected
  • Do the pages of the old website redirects to the new one smoothly 
  • What is the backup plan in case of an emergency? 

 

Once you get the answer to these questions is affirmative, you are all set to make an official launch of your website. 

Final Thoughts

When it comes to redesigning your website, the sky is the limit. You can make as many changes as you want. It’s a constant process. However, keep exploring new stuff, think about what will help your website grow, earn more leads, and more, and plan your website redesign accordingly.

Whether you are creating a cloud-based or a hybrid solution, we have the technical expertise you need.
About the Author
I’m a content writer sharing expertise-based advice & tech insights for business owners. Explore how innovative ideas change the game, or get useful advice on SaaS, IoT development, innovation, and startup growth.

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