Is it time to invest in a website redesign?
Website technology is constantly evolving, and it will keep evolving for the foreseeable future. However, keeping up with these latest trends is just not realistic, and sometimes, it could result in a massive loss of cash. But figuring out what’s amiss with your site can be a difficult task, especially when you don’t even know where to start.
The good news is, you’re not alone.
This is a modern-day problem that every company eventually encounters. A study published by a multimillion-dollar tech-firm, Bazaarvoice, showed that 82% of users consult the internet on purchases they are about to make both online and in-store. Even if your company sells services or products strictly in a brick and mortar store, you need to have a good website, or else you risk losing potential customers.
So how do you know it’s time for an upgrade? Well, when your 5-year-old desktop takes 10 minutes to start-up, while the fan is going haywire, obviously, it’s time to upgrade it. But how do you address a problem that’s not so obvious, like your website’s performance?
It is difficult to tell when your website needs a new face because it’s not always down to the technology, but how it all aligns with where your brand is today. In this post, we’ll be talking about the former and what you can do to figure out if the technology driving your website needs a little improvement.
Responsiveness
A website’s responsiveness is its ability to scale and “respond” to different screen sizes and devices. Pixel screen size, resolution, web-browser compatibility, operating systems, and the user’s device are all factors that affect your website’s responsiveness.
70% of the total digital media time in the US is spent on smartphones (Comscore, 2019), and more than 80% of shoppers used a mobile phone inside of a physical store to either look up product reviews, compare prices, or find alternative store locations (AdWeek). That’s a big part of your clientele that will look you up on a mobile device and, ideally, you want every experience your customers have with your company to be a good one.
Next time you’re on your computer, check the responsiveness of your website by resizing the window of your browser and ask yourself:
Does the look and feel of the site remain consistent?
Does the site still convey the same message?
Are there any functionalities that break? Are there any that are unnecessary?
Is the text legible and in the right place?
There are many more things to check when testing for this. But if there are any obvious issues, maybe it’s time for an upgrade.
Optimization
No one likes a slow website. But don’t take our word for it. Take Google’s.
According to them, any given page on your site should load in less than 2 seconds. Any longer, and the risk of losing your customer increases by 50% every second after that.
The tricky thing about site speed is that Google doesn’t have a straightforward definition for it. But to sum it up, your website should not only be fast, but it should also feel fast.
Did the navigation start properly?
How long until the user sees something? How long until they can interact?
Can the user interact if the page is not finished loading?
Do the interactions feel smooth and natural? Or do they feel buggy and clunky?
Google takes all of this and much more into account to determine how well your website performs, and luckily, they have free tools to test your site.
Click here to run a Google Audit on your website.
User Experience
So you’ve checked your site’s responsiveness and page speed, and they’re both pretty good. The next thing to check, and arguably most important, is the User Experience of your website.
We understand that User Experience, or UX, can be a bit complicated to articulate. To put it simply, it’s how a user feels when they navigate through your site. The result of every single element and aspect of your site. Anything from performance and security, to flow and accessibility, to branding and design.
So why should you invest money in a good UX for your site? Because bad UX may be costing you more.
Research shows that companies lose $62 billion every year due to poor UX, and 91% of frustrated users just leave, and 13% of them tell 15 more people about their bad experience.
Not only are you losing the customer that’s already on your site, but also the ones that haven’t even visited yet.
Did you know?
Jeff Bezos invested 100X more into customer experience than advertising during the first year of Amazon.
Finding the root cause of a faulty UX can sometimes mean extensive market research, A/B testing, user testing, etc. But a very easy and free way to test your site’s UX is to go through and navigate your site and ask yourself:
How easily can users access my products or services? Can it be even easier?
How many steps do they have to go through to get where I want them to? What may stop them?
Is the call-to-action clear and visible? Does it make sense?
Is the purpose of my product or service clear? Can it be even more clear?
Ask your friends, family members, employees, or even your own customers, if possible, to take a look. They can provide insight that may be crucial in leveling up your company.
Things to consider…
There are plenty of other factors that come into this equation, like the website’s visual appeal, security, accessibility. Well-maintained websites tend to have a longer life-span than a site that goes through a long time without maintenance. Nonetheless, sometimes, you just need an upgrade.
