Building a website redesign strategy

We all know the sayings, “you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover” and “it’s what’s on the inside that counts”, right? Well, these sayings may be true when it comes to books, movies and finding your soulmate, but when it comes to your website - it couldn’t be further from the truth!

Did you know that up to 94% of website users will create their first impression of your business based on website design alone? This means that if your website looks like it could be rocking it alongside Myspace in the Y2K era then you could be missing out on hundreds, if not thousands of customers.

So, you need to redesign your website from an ugly duckling to a beautiful swan, but how do you do it? Well, that’s why you’re reading this article, isn’t it? We’re here to help you through those first few steps of designing your own website strategy. 

How to know if you need a website redesign?

A complete website redesign can be a huge and daunting undertaking, especially if you don’t know where to start. So, the best thing you can do is to audit your current website and ask yourself “do I really need a website redesign?”

Maybe your current website design is sleek and beautiful, but the content doesn’t really perform well. Or, you think your content is great, but the functionality just isn’t there. Either way, it’s important to fix what isn’t working and fine tune the rest to ensure your entire website is performing it’s best against your competitors and follows Google’s best practices. To find out if you need a site redesign, ask yourself these simple questions:

• Is my website outdated?
• Are my online sales or website leads low?
• Is my website easy to navigate?
• Can my customers find what they need on my website?
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Does your existing website look outdated?

As mentioned above, an outdated-looking website can be the difference between securing a new customer or frightening one away. 

But you might not realise how much of an impact an old-looking website can make. Research has shown that around 38% of visitors will stop browsing a website if they think the layout is unattractive. So in this instance, looks really do matter.

Are your online conversions and sales decreasing?

It should come as no surprise but one of the major reasons a business will completely redesign their website is because of decreasing sales and poor conversion rates. In fact, a survey conducted by GoodFirms found that a whopping 80.8% of website resign projects were a result of low conversion rates. So, if your online sales are dropping and you don’t know why - it could be time for a website redesign.

Are your website visitors having a hard time navigating your website?

Sometimes the biggest thing we take for granted about a website is how it functions. If you’re hearing complaints that your website isn’t user-friendly or your customers feel like their clicks are sending them around in circles, this is an indicator of a much bigger issue. 

Every time a user struggles to know where to click, how to find what they’re looking for or does not understand what something means, it creates frustration and they are likely to go to someone else’s website instead.

Can customers easily find the information they need on your website?

Similarly to the point above, if your customer can't find the information they need on your website, you have a problem. This is particularly important for businesses that are in a niche industry that require a lot of nitty-gritty information like sizes, materials and dimensions. 

It’s also important if you sell a product in a highly competitive industry like ‘cars’ for example. If your customer needs specific information about the car they want to purchase and they cannot find that on your website they will go to a competitor who has that information front and centre. If you're coming across this issue then that means you'll probably need to redesign your website.

A risky website redesign project has no strategy

So, now you've assessed that you need to redesign your website for whatever reason - it doesn't convert well, the navigation doesn’t make sense or it looks incredibly outdated. Whatever the reason is, your next steps are going to be the same.

Most companies go about redesigning their business websites visually and this makes sense because that's what we can see. However, chasing a beautifully designed website and not thinking of the performance of that website is a big no-no.

Any great web agency, developer or designer will tell you that first and foremost a website needs to be backed by data to succeed. You may be concerned about how your website looks now but your first steps really need to be looking at the data behind your strategy to create a great website. 

Using data for a successful website redesign strategy

Using data to back up your website redesign strategy will give you the best chance of success. In fact, if you use data to influence your design decisions correctly, you can boost your website conversion rate up to 400%. Here are some of the best data avenues you can explore to help you create your website redesign strategy. 

SEO performance

If you've been on the internet for a hot minute, you'll know that SEO stands for ‘search engine optimisation’. SEO is the process of improving the visibility and ranking of your website pages in the search engine results page (SERPS), typically on Google. In other words, this means making your website easily found by users who are looking for your product or service.

To determine how well your website is performing SEO-wise, you’ll first want to look at the keywords that are currently driving traffic to your website. If certain keywords are performing well (and are ranking on page 1 of Google, for example), they should be included in your new design strategy. Similarly, if any particular web page on your site is already ranking well you should keep its basic structure intact and migrate it across to your new website. 

The main reason to take SEO performance into consideration in your new website redesign strategy is to ensure that your website is friendly for all search engines. There is a chance your website could already be performing well however, if your bounce rate is particularly high when customers get to your website, this could be due to navigational issues or, as mentioned above, an outdated looking website. 

User testing data

Usability testing is a process used to evaluate how easy it is for users to interact with a website, app, or other product. In other words, it's a way to make sure that your website is user-friendly. To do this, you'll need to gather test participants and ask them to use your website while completing specific tasks. 

These tasks can be anything from asking them to find specific content on your website to completing a purchase. As they do so, you'll observe their behaviour and take note of any areas where they struggle. This information can then be used to improve the usability of your website. Usability testing is an important step in the website design process, and it can help to ensure that your site is as user-friendly as possible.

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What insights can user testing bring?

• Identify issues with navigation 
• Understand how customers use your website
• Finding bugs and flaws

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Conversion performance data

Collecting and analysing your website’s conversion data is a great way to understand how your current website is performing. This data can come from a variety of sources, including website traffic analytics in Google Analytics and online sales tracked in your content management system (CMS). 

By understanding what factors are driving customers to convert, you can make more informed decisions about how to redesign your website. Additionally, conversion performance data can also be used to create benchmarks and track progress over time. In short, it is a valuable tool for any business that wants to ensure its website is working as effectively as possible.

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Key metrics to understand conversion performance?

• Total number of conversions
• Conversion rate
• Cost per acquisition
• Online sales

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Define your website redesign goals & objectives

Any business looking to redesign their website should ask themselves what specific goals they hope to achieve with the redesign. Without a clear goal in mind, it will be difficult to create an effective website that meets the needs of both the business and its target audience. 

Some common business goals identified during the website redesign process include generating new leads, converting more customers, and building brand authority.

However, each business is different, so it's important to tailor the goals to meet the specific needs of your company. Once the goals have been defined, the next step is to create a plan that will help turn those goals into reality. By taking the time to define your goals and create a detailed plan, you can ensure that your website redesign will be a success.

Some examples of common website redesign goals are listed below.

1. Bringing in new leads

The goal of bringing in new leads can seem like a lofty one but is absolutely necessary. To achieve this goal, you’ll need to set relevant objectives that directly correlate to attracting new business. 

These objectives can include ensuring your website is user-friendly and organising your content in a structured way using best practice SEO. You may even want to consider running a digital marketing PPC (pay per click) ad campaign after your new website is launched to attract new customers to your website straight away. 

2. Converting customers

One of themost important goals you can set for your website redesign is converting customers. There are a number of design choices that can help influence customers to convert on your website. 

Some of these design choices include using the Rule of Thirds, limiting the number of clicks a customer has to take to convert and creating clear call to actions on your website to encourage customers to book a service or complete a transaction. 

3. Building brand authority and awareness

Building brand awareness and authority is another common goal that many businesses have when redesigning their website. However, this goal can be difficult to measure and track.

One of the ways you can track your brand awareness is to ensure your tracking your personal brand keywords in a software like SEMrush or Ahrefs. If you see the number of searches for your business name increase, this could mean that your business name is getting out there. 

Brand authority on the other hand is a completely different kettle of fish. The goal to create brand authority essentially whittles down to wanting to ensure that your brand is trusted and recognised within your industry. 

So, to ensure you are recognised among your customers you need to show them that you are an industry leader. You can show your expertise and knowledge by creating a centre of educationally-rich articles as well as videos about your industry as a resource for your customers. 

Creating a resource centre for your customers is a clear objective that, in turn, can help you achieve the goal of building brand authority and awareness online. You can also work on promoting your content on other websites and earning minions in other people’s content too.

4. Building stronger relationships with customers

Trying to build a stronger relationship with your customers can be a difficult lofty goal for a website redesign. However, there are a number of objectives and actions that you can set in place for your website redesign to address this goal. 

You can build strong relationships by having online chat support to assist your customers when they're on your website. You can also provide educational material in the form of webinars and newsletters. The way to build a relationship with your customers is to provide them with something beneficial so that they will continue to return to your business. 

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Key takeaways

At the end of the day, designing and creating a new website redesign strategy from scratch can be a difficult task. There are a lot of things to consider, like whether your website really needs a redesign, how to use data to inform decisions about your strategy, and what goals and metrics you need to put in place to ensure your redesign is a success.

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Free website redesign strategy session*

Book a 90-minute strategy session and get a clear plan for business growth and a strategy for your website redesign project.

• Get a better understanding of your website needs
• We generate a detailed report from your strategy session
• Understand your priorities and next steps

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