Is your website performing to its utmost potential?
Every website is the digital “face” of the business or other organization it represents. From large companies to sole traders, non-profits to government agencies, and everything in between, websites must be on-brand, visually appealing, functionally seamless, and compellingly informative. They should also be fresh, dynamic, SEO-optimized, and encourage clickthroughs and conversions.
Is your website up to the task?
Do you need a website redesign – or just some clever tweaks?
KEY INSIGHTS
- Every website is the online face of the business or other organization it represents. It must be on-brand, user-friendly, and crafted to meet the needs and expectations of its target audience.
- Every website will, at some point, require a refresh, and this may require anything from some clever tweaks to a full redesign. Knowing which is right for you at the right time is crucial.
- Twelve12 is an expert marketing, branding, and web design agency offering comprehensive internet marketing services with expertise, insight, and creative flair for all types of businesses in Orange County and beyond.
Common triggers for business owners to redesign their websites are often driven by comparison with what their competitors are doing. This includes a design that feels stale, a competitor launches a shiny new website, or internal stakeholders ask for change. But remember, “comparison is a thief of joy”. These factors don’t necessarily justify a complete redesign of the site; savvy, targeted tweaks may be enough.
There are, however, times when a redesign is certainly justified – and recommended.
Website 101 – Considerations
A functional, appealing website supports your business in several ways. It needs to be easy to maintain and provide a positive, standout user experience.
Any website that is stale, bland, outdated, off-brand, not performing, or difficult to manage needs to be reassessed.
The question of whether to redesign or simply tweak your website will arise at some point. The answer will be driven, to an extent, by your available resources, time, and costs involved.
First and foremost, you need to consider your website in terms of your business goals, design, user experience, usability, content, security, navigation, site infrastructure, accessibility, and search engine optimization (which now also includes optimizing for AI-search results).
Some examples of questions to ask yourself include:
- Is my website design and content aligned to support my goals?
- Is my site design, visual elements, and content on-brand?
- Am I getting relevant traffic and referrals?
- Is it easy to update or tweak content on my website?
- Is my web content up to date and dynamic?
- Are my landing pages flexible and easy to read?
- Is my site design clean or cluttered?
- Is my website easy to navigate?
- How quickly do my landing pages load?
- Is my site mobile-friendly across devices?
- Do I have broken links or 404 error messages?
- Is my site built on a modern CMS such as WordPress?
- Is my website SEO-optimized?
- Do I have SSL?
- Is my URL optimized?
- Am I using strategic, relevant keywords?
- Do I have relevant internal links and backlinks?
- Do all my images and media have alt text?
- Do my landing pages have meta titles, meta descriptions, and H1 tags?
- Does the visual design and color palette consider color contrast/blindness?
- Is my site ranked highly by search engines?
Redesign or Tweak?
Redesign when:
- Your site experiences a sustained decline in performance, such as declining organic traffic, reduced lead quality, increased bounce rates, low clickthrough rates, and falling conversion rates.
- Your site is misaligned with your brand, or you choose to rebrand. i.e. after acquisitions, mergers, repositioning, or expansion into new markets. This will likely mean your visual identity now feels inconsistent, content and tone do not suit your target audience, or the messaging no longer reflects your brand, product, or service.
- Your site is not optimized across devices (both Android and iOS), especially for mobile. Signs include slow loading times, outdated layouts, poor navigation or display on small screens, poor touch integration with the site, or you are losing users.
- Your site is outdated – red flags include difficulty when refreshing or adding new content, layouts are inflexible, and accessibility is poor.
- You actively wish to restart from scratch.
In a nutshell, redesigning a website involves new layouts, new design systems, and structural changes to the site.
Tweak when:
Your site just needs to be optimized to:
- Improve page performance
- Update content
- Refine the user experience
- Address technical issues
Tweak your site when issues are minor or flexible, your conversion rates are improving or stable, you have a strong SEO performance, or your objectives for redesign are unclear. A full redesign in this instance can cause more harm than good, potentially disrupting search engine ranks, confusing audiences, and unwisely spending your budget.
Why Pay an Expert Web Designer Rather than DIY?
Redesigning a website should be based on the measurable impact it will deliver and clear objectives. It’s important that it’s undertaken in such a way that it does not confuse users or disrupt your existing SEO.
Only an expert website designer/developer has the experience, technical insights and proficiency, and vision to conceive of, create, and deliver a highly functional, original, polished website that conveys your unique brand identity and offering cohesively and appealingly. Moreover, web design underpinned by real SEO expertise makes a huge difference to your outcomes. There is no better way to optimize your online presence for your target audience, be noticed by the Google algorithm for all the right reasons, and appeal to your customers and prospects.
Choose Twelve12 for Website Tweaks, Updates, and Redesign
Twelve12 is a premier Orange County-based marketing agency offering superior web design services. Not only do we have a talented team of experienced creative designers, branding experts, and digital marketers; we also have a dedicated SEO provider on staff – meaning your website can be designed, redesigned, or tweaked with SEO principles at its foundation. The potential of this to help drive your visibility online can’t be ignored.
With offices located in Irvine and Newport Beach, we also work remotely – so wherever you are in the USA (or even internationally!), we’re here to help take your business to the next level.
Get in touch with us today!