Why You Shouldn't Wait to Redesign Your Businesses' Website
Why You Shouldn’t Wait to Redesign Your Businesses' Website
Think twice about putting off your website redesign project.
Many businesses put off website redesign because it can be time-consuming and costly. However, failing to redesign your website will cost you more in the long run. The Internet is always changing, so web technologies that were all the rage just a few years ago could be totally out of date today. Take Adobe Flash, for example, which is well on the path to extinction. If your website looks outdated and is difficult to use, visitors will simply leave and head to a competitor’s site instead. Web surfers often assume that a website offers nothing of value if it looks too old school.
People form an opinion of your website in approximately three seconds. If you’re selling products and services on your website, you have to put your best foot forward. While your website doesn’t have to be the most innovative and creative site in existence, it does need to be attractive, easy to navigate and use, and up-to-date. Make your first impression count!
Your Business Has Changed, But Your Website Has Not
If your business has undergone changes, a website redesign would be a great way to communicate them to customers and ensure that your website is consistent with your current business strategies and goals. If there are new features you’d like to add to your website, such as ecommerce or a blog, your best bet would be to incorporate those changes when you redesign your site so that they don’t look like an afterthought.
Get Found
It’s not enough to build a beautiful and functional website that meets your customers’ needs. To reap the full benefits of an online presence, you need a website that is optimized for search engines. Search engine optimization (SEO) is critical because it ensures that your website will be found by potential customers searching for your products and services online. A website redesign gives you the opportunity to map out content on your new site and rank highly for your target keywords.
Don’t wait till your site is already designed to get an SEO consultant involved. This could lead to costly website changes down the line that could have been taken care of quickly, easily, and inexpensively during the design process. Here are some factors to keep in mind when redesigning your website and implementing SEO:
- Perform keyword research and select specific keywords to target
- Create SEO-friendly content and optimize it for target keywords
- Create an SEO-friendly site structure and navigation
- Create SEO-friendly URLs
- Optimize images
- Develop keyword-rich title tags and meta description tags
Social media marketing is another important aspect of getting found online, so be sure to include it in your website redesign plans. If your current website doesn’t make it easy for people to connect with you and share your content via social media channels, you’re behind the times. Social media marketing is critical to spreading the word about your business, enhancing your search engine visibility, and building your brand online.
Attract Mobile Customers
If your website isn’t mobile-friendly, you risk losing traffic, visitors, and most importantly, customers. The mobile web has grown exponentially in recent years, enabling users to view websites while on the move. Make sure that your website is simplified, straightforward, and easy to navigate on smartphones and tablets by creating a mobile version of your site. Mobile users will abandon your website if it’s hard to find the information they need or the site takes too long to load. The majority of American consumers now own a smartphone or tablet - the future of the web is mobile!
An alternative to mobile web design is responsive design. Responsive design aims to provide an optimal user experience across a wide range of devices, from desktop to mobile. A responsive website resizes itself depending on the type of device being used to access it. Having a single, responsive website is far more cost-effective than building mobile apps for multiple platforms.
Convert More Visitors into Paying Customers
If you’re selling products and services on your site, gently nudge your website visitors to take action, whether you want them to call, fill out a form, make a purchase, or sign up for an email newsletter. Including a clear call-to-action on each page of your site will significantly boost conversion rates.
Redesign Your Website to Make It More Profitable and Effective
Efelle is a full-service web design and online marketing firm based in Seattle, Washington. We can help you redesign your website from scratch and generate a steady stream of leads and sales from the web. Call us at 206.384.4909 or contact us online to schedule a free consultation with our website redesign experts!