Studies show that the majority of website complaints have something to do with flaws in website design. What’s worse is that a staggering 88% of users probably won’t return to the same platform after one bad experience.
The importance of website design cannot be stressed enough, especially when dealing with fast-paced consumers. Your layout, visuals, and navigation must be on-point to establish your online presence and encourage repeat customers.
It’s important that you follow digital design best practices and put your best foot forward to avoid any hitches. But when the time comes that your numbers aren’t what they used to be, what should you do?
The answer is simple: go for a website redesign.
Revamping your pages can do wonders for your brand, be it in terms of SEO, conversions, and overall website health and performance.
The crucial step is knowing when to say goodbye to your old code and design. Overhauling what you’ve previously built is a big decision, and it would require a significant investment. Before looking up new pegs and color palettes, consider these 10 signs your website is due for a new look:
1. It’s no longer aligned with your business goals
Business goals evolve as your brand grows over time. Perhaps after gaining brand trust and a good following, you’d like to move on to expanding your products and services. Or maybe you’d want to reach out to a new demographic.
When your business goals are significantly different from when you first launched your website, it’s time to consider a website redesign. Your web pages should always work towards your objectives. Otherwise, you’ll be climbing an uphill battle trying to accomplish them.
Restructuring your homepage and navigation bar helps highlight current offerings and introduce new value propositions. Even simple improvements in your visuals like adding the right images and illustrations can draw in your target audience.
2. It loads slowly
Slow site speed is notorious for prompting users to exit without further engagement. A study in 2019 showed that a decrease in site speed by just one-tenth of a second pulled down conversion rates by as much as 10%. Google Search also penalizes slow websites by bumping down their ranking in favor of faster domains.
The reason for slow loading times is varied. It could be because of outdated plug-ins, malware, unoptimized graphics, and a faulty web server, among others. If you’ve addressed these problems and see no improvement, it’s time to move on to an upgraded platform.
Aside from addressing issues with site speed, a website redesign allows you to leverage new technologies that may not have been compatible with your old site.
3. It’s not mobile-friendly
The majority of global website traffic comes from mobile users. In the United States, 52.59% of web visits are made through mobile accounts.
Mobile dominance means there’s no excuse for running platforms that are unoptimized for smartphones and tablets. Not only do users hate them, but so do search engines.
Google Search Console offers a Mobile-Friendly Test to check how well your website performs on mobile devices. Low scores call for immediate action, especially if you own an eCommerce website. Implement a responsive layout and optimize your menus to ensure the best user experience.
4. Your pages aren’t ranking well
How often do you go beyond the first page of SERPs before deciding on what to click? If you answered rarely, you’re not alone. The average web user sticks to the first five results search engines provide. This means that if your pages don’t rank high enough, they’re essentially invisible.
On-page search engine optimization (SEO) dictates website rankings. Title tags, meta descriptions, internal links, and optimized images are examples of basic on-page SEO signals. While doing a redesign, you can create a better internal link structure and remove old links that no longer serve their purpose.
Improving your website’s overall UX/UI design is also a big plus for SEO and will shoot up your rankings in the long run.
5. Your bounce rate is too high
A high bounce rate is one of the best telltale signs of needing a website redesign. You can view your bounce rate on Google Analytics. On average, most websites have bounce rates between 41% to 55%. The optimal bounce rate is around 26% to 40%.
Although there are valid explanations for high bounce rates, if the metric is around 56% to 70%, it’s usually an indicator that something needs fixing. What determines bounce rates is user experience. Poor website navigation and unappealing design choices turn users off and push them away from your site.
When professionals do a website redesign, they identify where your current layout falls short and address pain points using UX/UI design principles. A good web design and development team knows how to simplify navigation menus, craft engaging web pages, and future-proof your platform for years to come.
6. It looks outdated
Modern websites look very different from what web pages used to be in the 90s and early 2000s. Flashy animations, walls of text, and table-based designs ruled the web for many years until CSS and interactive content were introduced.
Today, a lot of platforms sport minimalistic layouts with focal visual elements. Infinite scrolling and a mobile-first approach are also very prominent in our current context. Given that most of us visit multiple websites a day, it’s easy to spot outdated designs.
This is a problem because obviously old-looking websites are perceived as less credible and hard to use. So a fresh look means improved brand trust and better sales.
7. It’s hard to navigate
Website navigation affects every aspect of user experience. It’s involved in every task and interaction a visitor does to explore your website and engage with your brand. Most users don’t have the patience to spare more than a few minutes to figure out how to move around a digital platform.
Before even landing on your website, consumers already have set standards and expectations. For example, the majority of visitors immediately look for a navigation menu either on top of the web page or as a closable side navigation bar. If these expectations are not met, it could confuse users and force them to click away.
Optimizing website navigation is part of a large-scale redesign. The point of which is to streamline navigation options so that users can find what they’re looking for quickly and effortlessly, resulting in an enjoyable online experience.
8. Bugs appear frequently
Another sure giveaway that it’s time for a website redesign is the increased need to troubleshoot and address bugs.
Technical problems may be the result of plug-ins and extensions that are no longer updated by their developers. Older websites also suffer from compatibility issues and functionality bugs when they aren’t regularly maintained.
Spending hours going through error messages and resolving issues non-stop exhausts more resources than it returns. If you find yourself waking up to an inbox full of alerts daily, then it’s best to wipe the slate clean. Have a web development agency write a robust code and eliminate other causes of friction along the way.
9. It’s challenging to manage your content
Web technologies have advanced well enough to make a lot of our tasks easier to perform. For example, updating web content used to require website managers to learn how to code. But thanks to Content Management Systems (CMS), it’s already a thing of the past, at least ideally.
If you still need to do it the old fashion way, then your website is due for an upgrade. Consumers and search engines love fresh content, so having a website that only takes minutes to update is a huge advantage.
10. It’s not converting well
Last but not least is low conversion rates. Failing to entice visitors to complete the desired action, like signing up for your newsletter or checking out their cart, is a sign of an ineffective web design.
The problem could be with your web forms, the lack of social proof, or just an underwhelming user experience overall. These factors prevent visitors from feeling comfortable providing their personal information and doing business with your brand.
Again, small- and large-scale enhancements help gain their trust and eventually make them loyal customers.
Hire a Professional Team of Web Developers and Designers
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