“Art is never finished, only abandoned.” This quote, attributed to Leonardo Da Vinci, probably wasn’t referring to websites, but the wisdom contained in this sentiment applies nonetheless.
Websites are often heavily invested in, painstakingly designed, launched with great aplomb, and then…just kinda left to slowly rot until it’s time to start the process all over again.
The thing is, with a website, there’s always something that can be improved. New content to be published. Plugins that can be updated. Copy to be tweaked.
It’s never going to be perfect — perfection is a pursuit without a destination, yet it’s still a journey worth taking.
There are times, however, where your website needs more than maintenance. Tweaks aren’t going to give you the results you need. But how do you know the difference between if your existing website just needs regular updates, or if it would benefit from a total website redesign?
Here are five of the signs that it’s time for a website redesign.
1. Your Website Isn’t Mobile Friendly
If your website isn’t mobile friendly, you’re doing your business a massive disservice. According to the Pew Research Center, about three-quarters of Americans use their smartphones to make purchases.
This is especially true for consumers under the age of fifty, and presumably those numbers will continue to grow throughout the years.
Having a mobile friendly site is important for a few reasons, and one of them is user experience.
When you’re using your smartphone and you land on a website that was designed solely for a desktop experience, you run into all sorts of issues. Text is small and difficult to read. Clicking on links is a challenge. Important features are hidden due to the way the site renders.
People will quickly abandon your site, and you’ve lost an opportunity.
In addition to a poor user experience, Google announced last year that they will no longer rank sites that don’t render on mobile devices. This can result in countless lost opportunities.
Optimizing your site for mobile has long been a best practice, but with search engines actively penalizing sites, there’s never been a better time to redesign your website.
2. Your Themes And Plugins Are Outdated
Keeping your website up to date means more than making sure it’s aesthetically pleasing. It’s also critical that your site’s architectural structure — namely its theme and its plugins — are kept up to date to ensure that its functionality, security, and usability are in working order.
Neglecting to keep your website theme updated can lead to things like malware attacks, crashes, and other technical issues. And if your site crashes? It’s not always so simple to just update your theme and move on with your business. In actuality, it can lead to very costly and time-intensive web development work.
Similarly, when you neglect to keep your website’s plugins up to date — software that adds features to your website theme, like social media feeds, Google reviews, chat, and payment processing — you run the risk of a poor user experience, missing features, and security risks.
3. Your Website Has Difficult To Follow Navigation
Your website is part of a person’s journey. Full stop. They’ve experienced something — a need, a desire, a problem to solve, whatever — and through their research and by the grace of god they landed on your site.
Maybe they’ve landed on your homepage. Maybe it’s a product or service page. Could be a blog. But no matter where they’ve landed on your site, they need to feel that they’re welcome in your space, they know how to find what they need, and that they’ll want to come back in the future.
That means you have a responsibility to uphold. They’re guests in your house. How are you going to treat them now that they’re here?
My advice is to be very clear in the language that you use. Make the navigation as simple as possible, so no matter where they’ve landed, they know exactly where to go next. Your site map should be impossible to get lost in. Your buttons and calls to action should be bold and succinct.
Resist the temptation to overstuff every page with every “just in case” bit of information you’ve thought of in the development process.
If you can effectively help people understand what to do next while authoritatively providing them with the solutions they’ve been searching for, you’ve made yourself a new customer.
4. Your Content Is Obsolete
The quality of your content is essentially why people are visiting your website in the first place.
Search engines are crawling your site, evaluating its content, and ranking your site based on its quality, relevance, and the unique perspective it is providing.
But if you’re not actively updating your site with fresh, useful content? Then search engines aren’t incentivized to evaluate your site. And if search engines aren’t evaluating your site, then your ability to rank higher in search engine results is suppressed, and you’re likely missing out on client opportunities, sales, and growth for your business.
You might even be ranking for keywords that are no longer relevant to your business!
Publishing is important, but so is auditing. Are your products and services pages still relevant? Are your blogs still up to date? Could you be ranking for irrelevant keywords?
Your content strategy is critical to the success of your website, which means it’s critical to the success of your business.
5. Your Website Loads Slowly
I am old enough that I remember a time where I was willing to wait minutes for a website to load. 25 minutes to print a picture? Don’t mind if I do!
But alas, we are no longer as patient. There’s nothing novel about making your customers wait for your site to load, and the fact of the matter is, they aren’t going to wait.
According to one study, nearly half of shoppers will leave a site if it takes longer than three seconds to load. Three seconds. That’s the difference between earning a new customer or losing them to your competition.
Things like the aforementioned outdated plugins and themes, large image and video file sizes, and poorly designed code can all lead to a website that loads too slowly.
Let Formada Guide Your Next Website Redesign
If you’re looking for more business growth through your website, then let the Formada team help you with your website redesign.
Our team specializes in creating custom websites that are designed to engage your audience and grow your business.
Stop losing customer opportunities. Create more revenue. Achieve your goals. That’s what Formada is all about. Contact us today to learn more!