Redesign Your Website

I have been getting a lot of questions lately around website redesigns. When should they be done, how should they be done and what mistakes not to make. Below I have put forward some pointers that will help you make the right decisions and how to avoid the common pitfalls.

One thing that all my clients agree upon, is that before embarking on any redesigns, businesses should truly understand their goals and their customers. Without these necessary planning measures, you’ll wind up designing a website in a vacuum and wasting money. Here are just a few of the key questions that you should ask yourself before you change one pixel:

What Are Your Goals?

It is important to take a top-level view of a website. What are you trying to ACHIEVE with your website? Are you trying to attract new customers? Service existing customers? Portray a new image for your company?

What Are You Currently Doing Right?

Prior to doing any type of redesign, a business needs to look at what keywords are driving traffic and to which pages, and what pages have incoming links. Another area that needs to be evaluated thoroughly is who is coming to the site and what is drawing them in and from where.

Are You Doing This For the Right Reasons?

I have seen in the past that website redesigns happen for the wrong reasons. First, there’s the “redesign as part of new management. Not having a clear, strategic reason why they are redesigning,  is one I see regularly. Businesses still look internally for that answer way too often – new manager, new logo, re-organisation, don’t like the design.”

Businesses build sites as a means of fixing all their business issues, without looking deeper at their true problems. I believe “We deal with a lot of small to medium sized businesses and there are many who think a new website will be a field of dreams.” They never consider that the website should be build for the potential customer not what the manager/owner feels might look right. It is not for you it is for your customer, so from the off get inside the mind of your customers.

So, What are the “Right” Answers?

This last question is actually a trick question. There is no one right answer to these questions; every business has different motivations and goals with a redesign. However, take the time before starting to make sure that you’re investing your time and money wisely. To ensure that you are being true to your businesses needs & goals however big or small, really analyise if a redesign is necessary and what you want to accomplish.

Best of luck with your Endeavours!!

Lorcan.