Why are you considering a website redesign?

Does your website need more than a refresh? There are many good reasons for a website redesign. Rebranding would be a clear reason or moving to a more efficient Content Management System might be another. The foremost consideration should be if the current site is working or not working. The success of a website redesign depends on defining the purpose of the redesign at the beginning.

The website redesign process is the same as described on our Website Design page, but website redesign requires a strategy for improvement.

1) We start with a benchmark of your current website design performance, including:

• Number of visits/visitors/unique visitors
• Bounce rate
• Time on site
• Current SEO rankings for important keywords
• Number of new leads/form submissions
• Total amount of sales generated

Some of our clients have not tracked their site performance. They just know their website is not bringing in business. If that is your experience we can show you why your site has not produced results and what we can do to make it generate leads.

2) Set measurable goals using the benchmark as a target. Some objectives might be:

• Increase site traffic by a specific amount by a target date
• Increase time on site
• Reduce the bounce rate
• Increase number of leads
• Improve SEO rankings for specific key phrase

3. Analyze your competition
Remember, your competition is on page one for your valued key phrases, it is not necessarily the guy down the street. Once we audit your competitors’ websites and yours, we create an action list of what areas we can improve and what we can do better than your competitors.

4. Describe the personas of your target audience.
Understanding your target audience helps you target your content to their needs with solutions to their problems & aspirations. This is  where you start to build “solutions-first” marketing.

5. Inventory your digital assets

• Most shared or viewed content
• Most trafficked pages
• Best performing keywords you rank for and associated pages
• Number of inbound links to individual pages

6) Determine how you can repurpose existing digital assets and what new ones you need to create. Understanding your buyer personas will help here.

7) Redesign your site around target audiences. If you are ‘old school’ your current site is probably ‘corporate jargon’ which is a turn off for today's audience. Your website is not just about you. Your visitors want to know what’s in it for them. Speak to them in their language with content that has value for them. Our guide for charting buyer personas will help with this process.

Like the website design process, the remaining development steps include:

8) Apply our Search Engine Optimization strategies. Many of our website redesign projects have been sites that were not optimized at all. If your current website was built more than four years ago it most certainly will not reflect today's algorithms, optimization best practices and current keyword usage. Your current site may even be penalized. To understand algorithm changes over the last three years, read the Google update descriptions on our SEO page.

9) Create a number of call-to-action triggers every page.

10) Create an ongoing content strategy.
This strategy is especially important if you are adding Social to your internet marketing mix. Google algorithms reward fresh, original content. A site always benefits from a blog. In the least consider adding more pages on a timely schedule.

The final step is Post Design Metrics. See how well the redesign performs by using the same measuring tools that we used to create a benchmark.

If your company is considering a website redesign, download our simple Guide to the Stages of Website Redesign. And keep in mind you don't attack all the stages at once. You might do some of them in-house then call us in to refine, design and execute. Call us now at 954.257.7066 and ket us help you evaluate where you are with a benchmark website audit.