Choosing to redesign your existing website is a exciting time for both business owners and web designers. Most people think we start with a blank canvas and a world of possibilities, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
Good web designers redesign, awesome web designers realign
In this article we’ll discuss the business behind website redesigns. For designer’s and developers this isn’t the most inspiring and exciting aspect of a redesign however the business behind has the potential to make your website successful but can also ruin a perfectly good project. Changing requirements, bad briefs and poor communication can dash the hopes of both client expectations and web designers vision.
We’ll aim to give both business owner and designers a heads up on their next website redesign project and we’ll look at the following subjects dangers of redesigning and why incremental website design updates are preferable.
Dangers of a website redesign
Sometimes a complete redesign isn’t always the best move and it is often left to the web designer to make this call. Generally every few years a business owner is horrified by the state of their website design and demand a redesign to bring the website back into the current trends. Especially on the Sunshine Coast, a website design is completely thrown out and replaced by an entirely new one. The major pitfall is the design is redone and the website design looks beautiful – however the content isn’t updated, trends changes and technology change, a few years later the organization is again ashamed of the web design.
If you are considering a redesign be sure to ask yourself the following questions:
- Is the content outdated and ineffective?
- Are there inconsistencies in design and branding on the website?
- Do you have the cash flow for a entire redesign every few years?
- When was the last time you updated the website?
- Do you think your users will respond well to the redesign?
Incrementally improving a web design Sunshine Coast and Rockhampton business is a better way to keep your website relevant, especially for clients with smaller budgets. We call these small updates realignment of your website to meet specific business objectives over time.
However a website that receives incremental updates is often subject to design inconsistencies and can effect underlying website code. The design inconsistencies can create user interface problems and the code changes see features added and others drop then your web company looses track of what is used and what is not, created bloated files and outdated code.
The key is to have a honest web designer to perform incremental changes and then to tell you when a entire redesign required.
Website redesign indicators
There are already 2 reasons for an entire redesign, user interface inconsistencies and unmanageable / out dated website code. There are further issues; if your website is suffering from performance issues, slow load time, errors or lots of SEO problems such as duplicate page titles etc then it might be time for a complete website redesign.
Sometimes a redesign is required because the current website design has reached it limits where some design elements are hard to change without completely affecting major elements of the website. This could be the grid and a responsive website issue, where your website design just will not be compatible with a tablet or mobile device.
Working in website design on the Sunshine Coast for the past 4 years here are the most common reasons why I have seen a website requiring a total redesign:
- Trends change
- Major code changes (website is generally over 5-6 years old)
- Business model change
- Poor conversion rate
- Customer support requests because the website isn’t working properly!
- Rebranding
Most of these are business drivers and are not necessarily pure aesthetic where results benefit from immediate action. That is to say, if your conversion rate is dropping or your business products / services have changed then business owner’s do not want to wait 2 years for the next major redesign to address the change.
If you want your website to run at peak efficiency then you cannot wait to just make major changes to it.
Therefore incremental change is preferable. Technology moves so fast especially online. Things you can do now are dependent on the actual problem, your local website designer can recommend small changes from updating your fonts to better structuring your user interface.
If you decide on a major redesign for whatever case, it is important to remember those decisions should be almost entirely business driven and decided as part of an ongoing and incremental process of development to your businesses online presence.
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