I meet people everyday who ask me about the best time to redesign your website. There’s a lot of misinformation and over-saturated information out there, which makes it really difficult to obtain the right answer.
A successful website is one that provides the exact right information its intended visitors need. It’s much like a great burger: many components come together to deliver a delicious result. The trick is to choose the right ingredients and deliver them in such a way that people want more.
It’s easy to get caught up in the important day-to-day website workings, content and analytics. But it’s also important to take time to review your website every six months to make sure it’s achieving the business goals you expect.
Part of that website assessment is to experience your site through your customer’s eyes.
- Is the site easy to navigate?
- Is there a clear call to action?
- Can the customer/client get in touch with you easily?
- Does your site answer their questions?
- Is there anything that’s causing “friction” between your visitor and their needs?
- Does your site convey your company’s unique value?
I find that a lot of business owners and marketing directors delay taking action on website redesign. This is perfectly understandable considering some of the horror stories I’ve heard from clients about their former website providers.
I encourage you to examine the following reasons to redesign your website and if one or more of these resonate with you, please consider taking action. I’m happy to answer any questions you have as I’ve been in your position. In fact, I started designing WordPress websites for this exact reason.
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7 Persuasive Reasons to Redesign Your Website Now
1. Your website doesn’t immediately convey the company’s value or why visitors should choose you.
It takes about 50 milliseconds (that’s 0.05 seconds) for users to form an opinion about your website that determines whether they’ll stay or leave.
You can get everything else right, but if a user can’t make a justified decision about why they should choose your business over a competitor, they’re going to click away.
46% of buyers will immediately leave a website if it’s not clear what the company does. Keep your visitors interested by immediately conveying what’s in it for them.
2. Outdated aesthetics and/or coding.
Think about your own experience: when you visit an outdated website that looks ugly, old or neglected, you assume things about the company behind the website…and most of your assumptions are not good.
You may think to yourself:
“Business must be slow for these people. It doesn’t look like they’ve touched their site in 5 (or 10+) years.”
or…
“Why, why, WHY do I have to pinch my phone to zoom in on this website?”
or…
“I wonder if this company is even still in business.”
Then you say, “Oh well” before hitting the BACK button.
Visitors to your outdated website are making the same assumptions.
FACT: an outdated website hurts your credibility.
- People think you just don’t care.
- Quality of goods and services become questionable.
- The company expertise is “outdated.”
- Google rankings are penalized.
3. Your navigation presents a challenge.
Your website’s navigation serves two purposes:
- It helps the user find what they’re looking for.
- It helps search engines categorize what you offer.
Website visitors should come first, search engines second. Use descriptive navigation instead of generic text. Use words that your visitors would use and words that your visitors are searching for. It’s fewer clicks for the user and it helps search engines indicate relevance.
Keep menus short and concise so that they serve the user’s needs. Avoid the temptation to over-complicate. Your customers are on your website to do something, so the navigation should help them do that thing as quickly and as pain-free as possible.
Included in the process to redesign your website should be the simplification of menu navigation.
4. Your site isn’t connecting with prospects.
A website needs a redesign if the current site doesn’t broadcast an emotionally congruent message, between the optics and feel of the site, and the emo-connection of the service and personality of the business owner and staff.
Very often, through poor website design, we observe the “Why” (purpose, cause, belief) of a business is almost silent, which is contrary to the tenets of creating connections with clients and prospects. Closer connections lead to higher sales.
5. Visitors are not remaining on your site.
Your website is often your potential client’s first impression. If people leave your site soon after arriving, there’s a good chance it’s poor website design.
If you’re spending good money to get people to your site, only to have them bounce off, examining your site’s design will actually save you money. A fresh design, along with analyzing traffic through Google Analytics, will help get a higher return on investment (ROI) for the marketing and advertising dollars spent.
6. Your site is slow.
39% of people will stop engaging with a website if images won’t load or take too long to load. (Source: Adobe)
Pages with a longer load time tend to have higher bounce rates and lower average time on page. Longer load times have also been shown to negatively affect conversions.
In July 2018, Google rolled out “The Speed Update” for all users, desktop and mobile, indicating that site speed is an important search ranking factor.
People want to be able to find answers to their questions as fast as possible — studies show that people really care about the speed of a page. – Google Webmaster Central Blog
Google has indicated site speed (and as a result, page speed) is one of the signals used by its algorithm to rank pages. And research has shown that Google might be specifically measuring time to first byte as when it considers page speed. In addition, a slow page speed means that search engines can crawl fewer pages using their allocated crawl budget, and this could negatively affect your indexation.
In the process to redesign your website, updated site architecture, dedicated servers, modern themes and caching tools will aid in improving your site’s speed.
7. Your site is not optimized for mobile.
Optimizing your site for mobile involves implementation of “Responsive Design.” Any website redesign should include a responsive theme and customer-centric design.
Responsiveness refers to the type of device your visitor uses to access your website. You create a positive experience for your prospect because your website adapts to the device (phone, tablet, desktop) they are using.
Is it time to redesign your website?
An updated, modern website redesign can become a fresh start for your business. It can help refocus your business goals and improve digital marketing efforts.
Get my latest business tips, exclusive content, and a bit of fun straight to your inbox with the Kruse Control Newsletter. Boost your profits with our proven advice. Sign up now – it’s free!