If you want your company’s website to not only earn you new business on a regular basis but also represent the level of quality you offer – and attract the best possible employees, you need to make sure it’s up to date.
Does that mean a redesign every year? No.
Are their ways to modify your website without a full refresh? Absolutely.
For the purposes of this article – let’s discuss what a full website redesign/refresh should look like, and how often we suggest the average business to invest this kind of time and effort / financial resources.
How often should a brand refresh their website?
3-5 years. We believe that after 3-5 years your website may not accurately reflect the organizational structure of your company, the needs, and desires of your customers, and be up-to-date with modern website design styles. It’s not just about looking stylish, it’s about looking trustworthy, and relevant.
- In 3-5 years the website design standards have shifted significantly.
- From 2010 to 2015, mobile responsive design had become the standard.
What is the big shift over the past 5 years?
From my perspective – we’re looking at websites that are all about the company, where-as the current mode we’ve been persuing is being ‘all about the customer’ – which is a pretty big shift the past couple years and to me will have a bigger effect for a company’s bottom line than any flashy design improvement.
However, having video incorporated into sites, and throughout sites is also gaining stronger popularity – photos cutting into white space with organic shapes have become more common, and companies are putting more of an emphasis on mobile navigability and making the interior pages feel more fleshed out like home-pages for people that land there from search engines.
What constitutes a full website redesign/refresh?
Full stop – from scratch, photoshop and all.
We even start on paper – but a full website redesign means a company is going back to the drawing board and discussing how they can better communicate persuasively to their ideal customers.
We think every website design in 2019-2020 should include:
- An unrelenting focus on your ideal customer – and making them the hero
- A super easy to navigate mobile menu, compelling mobile layout
- Images that draw the reader, help them imagine themselves working with you, and headlines that knock their socks off
What are your other options besides a full redesign?
You can always just modify your existing website. In fact, most companies that are trying to redesign after only a year or two – should really consider this option, as you lose a lot of data in a redesign, rather than modifying and monitoring conversion rate.
The temptation is strong to just start from scratch – but there are massive benefits to modifying an existing design, including:
- Allows you to to make incremental changes, and monitor conversions while focusing on a few key elements.
- You can do A/B testing, and have clarity around why things changed in Analytics.
- You can keep the stuff you actually like, and redesign the stuff that’s ineffective, vs. throwing it all away.
When should you redesign and when should you ‘modify?’
You should be thinking about incremental modifications in the first 3-6 months after a redesign, but certain signs might show up that something deeper is needed, if:
- You determine your customers are leaving the site quickly, and very few people are contacting you.
- The site really doesn’t appear to be telling your story in a compelling, modern way.
- Large scale changes are needed in the navigation, layout and information architecture. (The way the pages play together)
This will only hurt a little. A few things we think about during a redesign:
There are so many variables during a website design project, but if it’s done right – it should be a little uncomfortable and take some time investment from internal stakeholders at the beginning so that a website design and development team can get the information they need to make something truly compelling.
We can’t promise it won’t be somewhat difficult, that there won’t be back and forth, or that you may know a ton about your business that takes some time to transfer into our team’s heads.
But here are 3 things we can promise to clients and we think website design teams should be capable of:
1. We’re going to do our absolute best to make this process as simple as possible for you.
2. We’re at a cutting edge of modern design, so you’ll never need to worry about whether your site will look good or not.
3. It’s going to go through at least 3 Quality Assurance checks before you see the developed site.
If you like the idea of a company that tells you how it is, is willing to get down and dirty to understand your business – and will do whatever they can to make a website that you’re in love with – send us a message now.
