The website redesign checklist is a concrete plan of action for generating a stellar, fresh, high-performing business site. You cannot overlook this process as it is a game changer. If numbers are to be believed, 59% of internet users love fast-loading, smart-looking, and easy-to-navigate websites. If your website does not match these bare minimal expectations, then forget about the idea of landing this two-thirds of the internet crowd on your site. So, if you are planning to redesign your website then you have a giant task at hand. We are listing down a few must-do checks before diving straight into the design phase. Refer to the list to gain more clarity on your objectives and to refine them into finer goals.
Let us chart down the steps to be taken before actually going for website redesign. Brands may not need a complete redesign as a smarter upgrade would do the needful. Therefore, have a reality check and acutely gauge what is needed for your site.
Performance is not just the speed of the website but how much attention it draws from the visitors. Check if you have repeat customers or are your leads getting converted to customers or not. By having an eye on these aspects, you will be able to formulate an approach for redesign. It will help you figure out whether you just need a UX upgrade or an entire transformation that covers the user journey and delivers an exceptional end-user experience. If your site is lacking in SEO, you will be dumped by search engines. This way, a site audit is a must to get hold of what is not working for your site.
If you want precision in judgment, you must go through the sitemap of the existing site and analyze the performance of each page. It may take some time, but the effort is worthwhile. By studying key metrics like traffic, bounce rate, user trends, and more, you will gain clarity about the minutest of challenges to overcome by the website redesign process. It will also define a set of pages that need more attention than others.
Any technical, logical, or SEO errors that hamper your organic search results, should be jotted down. You have to get rid of them during the redesign process. Content-related issues, missing keywords, broken links, and other optimization bottlenecks should be assessed without fail. Revered platforms like SEMRush, Google Search Console, etc. can help you with this. They give as many as 120 factors that can help you get errors, warnings, and suggestions to improve your existing website.
You might think your site is serving the customer by charting down your abilities and innovative solutions. However, the idea is to see if your website is solving the issues that people face in services. Are you serving what they need or just offering content that highlights your calibre? Well, times have changed and so, should the content strategy. Your website should be serving them with solutions to their technical issues. If existing content is not focussed on this element, then you will need to change that also during the website redesign process.
By going through the user journeys of your current customers, you will be able to find the bumps, vents, and turns that they face in their purchase process. It will help to gauge what makes them not convert into a customer. This is important to create a better strategy for the redesign. Your new site should stump off all the glitches faced by users to serve them with a flawless end-user experience.
You must not lose out on any USPs, benchmarks, and positive aspects of the existing site. They should be kept as it is or optimized as per the need of the hour. Refrain from wasting time and effort on fixing things that are already working well. Pages showing good metrics should be used as a benchmark for upcoming pages.
Astutely observe the issues with the current design of the website. Flaws like dull colors, complicated navigation, cumbersome payment processes in eCom sites, and many minor problems end up delivering a bad end-user experience. This should be worked upon in the new version of the website. For any business, the main focus is to serve its customers and deliver a satisfying experience to them. So, ask your design team to list down the current UI/UX challenges.
You must check for the 404 errors to rule out any issues with pages that grab good backlinks. Make sure that you don’t lose out on pages that draw a pool of traffic on your website. Find pages that are low on link-building capacity, and add them for optimization during the redesign process.
If you are on a spree to redesign a website, make sure that you have clearly defined goals for the new site. Jot down metrics related to sales, traffic, keyword rankings, lead conversion ratio, etc. Also, focus on refining the brand story, if needed. Assess the logical, technical, creative, and marketing objectives to come to a point where you can redefine precise goals. The whole idea of redesign is to achieve these goals, so, do define them with absolute precision.
Finding what is working for your immediate competitors, their plus points, drawbacks, etc, would bring depth to your analysis and execution phase. While the objective is not to outshine competitors, the sole purpose of the peer-to-peer analysis is to create a site that proves equally competitive yet highly individual for your brand.
Although you would have done market research for an existing site, you need to repeat the steps to tap into the new-age market. The point is to come up with a site that matches the taste of the customer. The redesigned site should be palatable to the changing needs, browsing habits, and purchase journeys of the customers. It should offer things that serve the preferences of the customer. This step brings precision to the plan of redesign. It will help build a market-ready website that taps into every demand of the customer.
Site performance is affected by various reasons including technical coups. You cannot underestimate the power of adding a new plugin that adds a never-seen-before functionality. Apart from that, an add-on that accentuates your brand and business, should not be missing from your site. If it is, then include it in the redesigned website. This is just an example, you can find many technical miss-outs in the current site. Gather them to get a clear indication of the redesign budget as well.
You should be dead sure about the time frame required for the website redesign. An estimated time with some buffer for ad-hoc glitches will help you with setting up your budget. Speaking about monetary aspects, a redesigned site may take a huge chunk of money. Make sure that you have an extra chunk for emergency issues that may crop up during execution.
Well, a clear vision about the time taken for each phase of the redesign is a must. Plan it with your technical teams to ensure that the website redesign process is completed in the desired period. A realistic time estimation will help in avoiding any kind of rush. Honestly, you will need time to build an extraordinary website so, have patience. Fix a deadline and then break it into smaller portions that mark milestones. This is the easiest way to track progress during execution.
You need to gather the technical, creative, marketing, and execution teams to give inputs for a better version of your website. Listen to all of them, ask for suggestions, and meticulously build an infallible strategy for website redesign. The strategy should involve everything – UI/UX changes, SEO hacks, plugin inclusion, out-of-the-box solutions, and clearly defined time-frames for each phase of the redesign process.
If you have a team that matches the skillset of exceptional web developers, then a DIY should be considered. However, it can be time-consuming for them. Professionals with hands-on experience in web development are the best solution. They should be checked out online or through references. Weigh their merits against your requirements, budget, and deadline. A good design agency will save your time, and effort and deliver results without any delays. So, consider hiring over DIY.
Before beginning the redesigning phase, you must take a complete backup of the existing site. This is to prevent any accidents or damages while transferring data to the redesigned version. Make sure that the web design agency does that for you.
Make sure that the redesigned site tells your brand story with panache. It must have a visual language that is easy to understand yet charming for the customer. It should reveal the brand image, core values, and brand story with a clear, concise message. Choose the color scheme, logo design, page layouts, etc, that showcase branding along with the latest trends. Work as per the latest trends as they stay relevant for an upcoming period of two to three years. With this, you would set the ground for a smart, good-looking website.
The new site map with an intuitive web design, flawless navigation, and impeccable user experience, is your gateway to success. At this time, you need to have a pen and paper to create a sitemap that covers all loopholes of the existing site. Mark the landing pages, blog link, contact info or form, etc, in the new map.
Follow the latest, efficient design principles while keeping the brand identity at the core. Define a hierarchy with significant design elements at the top. This way, the visitor will not miss out on important information like deals, CTAs, etc. Think about arranging contrasting design elements, color coordination, alignment, white spaces, proportions, and textures, to carve out a matchless page design. Maintain a balance by bringing symmetry and cohesiveness to design elements.
While you keep the high-performing content, you should plan a fresh content strategy as per the latest trends. It should cover the business requirements as well as maximize interactive behavior. Define the tone of voice, intent, and informative pieces like CTAs, user registration forms, etc. The new strategy should focus on customer engagement, retention, and conversion.
The next thing is to bring your best SEO game forward. The redesigned site should have higher web accessibility than the current one. For that, SEO is of prime importance. Contextual content with the right keyword blending, image content with proper alt-text, efficient page meta tags, and proper domain name; are a must. To avoid losing the current search engine ranks, it’s vital to choose a 301 redirect map, which links old URLs to new equivalents.
The redesigned site should be mobile-friendly at all costs. The design elements should be chosen in a way that a clutter-free design stands out on the small screen. The mobile version of the site has more chances to get ranked by search engines. You cannot afford to miss a mobile-friendly site, as it not only ranks faster but draws more customers, sales, and ROI.
Inspect the site or get reviews from experts. Observe any missing elements, to correct them on time. If the redesigned site is up to the mark, pass it on to the marketing team to integrate social media handles, newsletter sections, etc.
Once the redesign phase is over, let the site pass through the performance tests. Monitor important metrics that involve page loading speed, user engagement, traffic pool, conversion rates, SEO parameters, and more. This will fine-tune the site with the necessary changes.
A/B testing deals with monitoring user reaction for two different versions of webpages. These pages will have separate design elements. It helps to figure out the version that gives the best end-user experience. By choosing the best version, your site can improve conversion rates. It is also an ideal way to retain customers.
It depends on the size of the existing site. A large site would take considerably more time compared to a smaller site. It also depends on the amount of changes, additional plugins, newly defined pages, etc. Normal estimation is anywhere between two and five months. However, the web design agency can predict it with precision.
If you are looking for a web design agency that aces in website redesign, KrishaWeb is the best choice. We are a group of creative web designers who are experts in delivering futuristic high-end websites. Connect with us to discuss things in detail!
Experienced Project Manager and Scrum Master at KrishaWeb, delivers expertise in Scrum methodologies, Laravel, React.js, UX design, and project management, ensuring efficient project delivery and agile implementation.
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