Let’s start by getting straight to the point! Website redesigns come and go, but most companies continue to use the same website redesign strategy.
A Traditional web design agency treats websites as though they are finished after a couple of months and require no further attention.
In reality, however, you should treat your online presence as an ongoing work in progress.
Think about it: No professional marketer would create Facebook ads and expect the first ad image idea to be the best performing one.
You would test it against other ad creatives and keep optimizing your advertising strategy to achieve the best possible results.
A web design project is not quite as simple as setting up an online ad, but they’re both pretty similar.
It not only changes how we approach website redesigns, but it also changes how our clients pay us for them.
outline
- Why Do You Need a Website Redesign Strategy?
- The Best Website Redesign Strategy for 2022 (& Beyond)
- Start With Your Ideal Customer in Mind
- Write Engaging Content That Speaks Directly to Your Ideal Customer
- Design a Customer-Centric Website
- Develop Your Site on a Framework That Lets You Scale
- Ongoing Design Updates and Conversion Improvements
- A Better Way to Manage Your Website Redesign
Why Do You Need a Website Redesign Strategy?
So you’ve decided that your web design needs an overhaul, and it’s time to start from scratch. But hold on.
Before you decide to hire a web development company or a full-time web developer for your business, you should first ask yourselves three fundamental questions:
- Why do we need a website redesign?
- What do we want to achieve with the new design?
- How do we plan our website redesign to eliminate risks?
There are many reasons why companies redesign their website. Most of them, however, do it for the wrong reasons.
Some business owners randomly choose when to update their websites. Others update their websites when they have the time and resources available.
Unfortunately, the #1 answer for why the marketing manager or chief executive officer decided to redesign the company’s website is still “because we just felt like it.”
“I just feel like the design doesn’t fit the brand any longer
Not only is this a risky way for a business to operate, but it is also not customer-centric.
“Your website is for your CUSTOMER, not your EGO!”
However, this isn’t even the biggest problem with business websites.
It is your website redesign strategy.
The traditional approach to web design typically involves:
- waiting 2 to 3 months before updating your site.
- completely redesigning the website
- repeating the cycle.
Brands miss out on many opportunities by not having an online presence.
Why?
Because your business doesn’t stand still for 2 years. Your products, services, and customers are evolving.
Especially in digital marketing.
Marketing has changed dramatically in the last two years, and marketers are reporting that it’s changing even faster now.
I think you would agree that digital marketing trends haven’t slowed down.
Lean Web Design: The Only Website Redesign Strategy That Makes Sense
Fortunately, there‘s a better way to go about a website redesign. And it is not rocket science either.
In a nutshell:
Instead of trying to fix everything at once, you can continually update and improve your site over time.
Yes, you are right.
There is nothing groundbreaking or new about this concept. Continuous updates and improvements are the foundation of the lean startup methodology.
It is also the secret behind famous growth stories like Dropbox, Wealthfront, and many others.
These companies know that everything in business (their products, their marketing strategy, and even their business model) is a constant work in progress. Ultimately, it will very likely change. Your web design is no exception.
After your design agency has completed the development phase for your new site, it does not mean that you no longer need to touch it.
It only starts with one website redesign that serves as the starter page for your new business.
Once the starter page is complete, you’d then implement continuous website improvements based on user feedback and web analytics.
For example:
- Rewriting your landing page copy
- Changing the web page layout
- Adding new content sections
- Testing new pricing tables
- Fixing technical issues
- Optimizing SEO settings
- Create new graphics/illustrations
The list goes on and on…
The Lean Web Design process follows a specific order to help you create the best possible web experience for your potential customers.
- Formulate an ideal customer profile
- Create engaging content that speaks directly to your customer
- Design a website that converts better than others.
- Develop the approved design concept
- After launch, keep improving and optimizing the site
As a result, your business will be able to generate more leads and sell more products.
Read on to learn more about the five steps of the lean web design process and how to execute website redesigns with less risk and better results.
Step 1:
Create an Ideal Customer Profile
Websites are for customers. To be exact, they’re for your ideal customer.
Instead of starting the project by copying your competitor’s website, try to create something that’s more customer-focused.
Understanding your customers is the most important thing you can do to improve your business.
If you don‘t know your potential buyers‘ needs, how can you meet them? You start your website redesign journey by building a customer profile. A customer profile or buyer persona is a detailed overview of your ideal customer.
Rather than focusing on telling a brilliant story about your product, your customer persona allows you to make your customers into the heroes of the narrative.
By understanding your customers, you can develop the perfect product-market fit and work that theme into your website redesign.
Website Redesign Project Plan Template
Projects can get messy if you don’t plan them well. Web design projects are no different from any other type of project.
Why You Need to Start With Your Customer In Mind
A buyer persona will help you to understand the right channels to use to reach your customers, whether it’s through social media, email, or your website.
Most importantly, it will help to discover how to match the goods or services you offer with your customers’ wants and needs.
Understanding what your customers need and their behavior helps you present your solutions at the right time and place.
Most websites – especially B2C websites – don’t speak to anyone.
Like this one:
They only talk about themselves using industry jargon that‘s extremely vague and confusing
Guess who responds to those kinds of sites.
That’s right – nobody.
Understanding your customer profile is essential because you need to know how to explain your offering to them in terms they can understand and relate to.
Most importantly, you can define the brand in a way that will make potential customers care about your product or service.
Once you know how you want to speak to your customers (your customer personas), you need to develop a plan for creating content that speaks to them.
Step 2: Write Engaging Content That Speaks Directly to Your Ideal Customer
Content creates conversions, and only if you connect with them on an emotional level, then present their solutions to the problems they have.
Content includes anything you use to relay your brand message, including words, images, videos, and interactive objects. Any content that you create for your website should provide value to your ideal customer.
Luckily, once you know the info that your prospects need before deciding whether to buy from you, you can create content that solves their problems and presents it in a way they understand.
You should at least start with creating the overall content structure for your new website before you see the new web design.
It’s important to format your text Your content must be structured in a way that naturally guides potential buyers to your message/product.
The logic that consumers use during research about goods and services is called the buyer’s journey.
Content format is all about the logic used by your customers during the buyer’s journey – not your logic.
Buyer’s Journey helps you understand the type and timing of content that your potential customers want and when they need it, so you can create it for them.
It also helps you to know how people expect to find information on your website.
Step 3: Develop Customer-Centric Web Design
The hard-sell is a dead art.
In the past, marketers would pummel potential customers with confusing jargon and exaggerated claims.
Today, the internet has laid the days of the hard sell to rest.
Now, potential buyers can go online and research nearly any good or service. Your website should be able to show and prove how your product or service provides real value.
If your website isn’t helping you grow your business, it’s almost useless. That’s one reason why you need to design a website that converts better – not just for looks.
You Only Have a Few Seconds to Make a First Impression
Surprisingly, the biggest mistake businesses do on their website is a lack of clarity.
46% of potential customers leave a website immediately if they don’t get a clear message about what a business does.
Another 37% of visitors will leave your site if they encounter a poor design or navigation.
3 Winning Web Design Cheat Sheets
People don’t care about products or services. They want solutions to problems they’re having, and you need to demonstrate that you can solve their problems.
If you can show customers right away that you can resolve their pain points, you’ll win them over. More importantly, you’ll boost your bottom line! Resolving pain points is the main idea behind the customer-centric design.
What this means is that you should redesign your website based on the behavior, needs, and wants of your ideal customers.
Of course, an attractive website is essential, but beauty is not what makes customers convert.
Customer-centric design is a shift in mindset from focusing on appearance to focusing on how to solve the problems of potential buyers.
Appledew UK Based Website Design Company can help you pinpoint your customer’s wants and needs to create the content, features, and functions your customers crave.
By understanding your consumer desires, you can exceed their expectations and create the ideal UX for your customers.
Step 4: Develop Your Site on a Framework That Lets You Scale
You should always strive to deliver the highest quality while using the least resources. Apply the same idea to your own site. Your website should be easy for you to use and your customers to use. Easy use is the foundation for lean web development that is spreading across the internet.
For example, WordPress is the world’s most popular content management system. It does take some technical expertise to use WordPress. It’s not as difficult as using more complex open-source platforms.
You can use similar, scalable tools such as WordPress for your online store needs.
Yes. They all require some technical know-how, but you can make them yourself if necessary. You don’t want to depend on your developer to make minor content updates.
The wrong agency will usually charge a lot of money to update your website and take weeks to get back to you.
Also, you should always have control of your site. If you’re serious about your business growth, you need a web designer and developer to help you make website changes when you want them.
Note: If you need help running your website, we offer services. Check out the website management service.
You can often partner with an experienced service supplier who can maintain your website at a fraction of what it would cost you to do it yourself.
For example, you could hire a website development company to manage your website on WordPress. Especially if you’re going to be doing a major redesign.
Step 5: Ongoing Design Updates and Conversion Improvements
Outdated website management practices were expensive and faulty. Many businesses used to redesign their websites approximately every two years.
Business owners who conform to the schedule cannot react to market changes. They’re stuck. They had to wait for the next planned redesign, and that was if everything went smoothly. You should regularly update your website so that it remains fresh and up to date.
However, if you want to redesign your site completely, for example, every single month, then you don’t need to. It would be too expensive and confusing for your customers if you did a monthly redesign.
However, business owners using the web design method keep making necessary changes every month. By adjusting the customer feedback regularly, you can exceed your inbound marketing goals.
This website redesign strategy tackles the issues associated with traditional site management.
Rather than investing a lot of money at once into a big, random, expensive project, you’d make small improvements every month. Of course, you would base your improvements on customer input.
By addressing customer concerns, you can make quick improvements that provide the most benefit to your customers.
How Much Should You Invest in Your Website Redesign?
You can find freelance web designers who will set up a basic website for $250. However, don’t expect much. On the other hand, some agencies charge six figures for a full website redesign. For you, it comes down to whether you’re willing to invest time and effort into the project. If increasing your conversion rate by 1 percent would mean $50, 000 in additional revenue, you could easily spend $20,000. Calculate your ROI on a new website design here.
Traditional website design techniques can take a long time to complete. Worse still is that it may not even generate more leads or sales.
The old way of designing websites involved using what worked well in the past to make guesses about what would improve performance in the future
It wasn’t uncommon for an expensive website redesign to fail. On top of that, companies were stuck with a website that didn’t work until the next redesign.
A Better Way to Manage Your Website Redesign
Your website is usually your only chance to make an initial impression on potential customers. You can improve your odds of winning new business by following lean web development principles.
More importantly, you should be able to provide value to your customers every month. By using your customers’ real-time behavior and their feedback to identify opportunities for improvement, you’ll be able to redesign your site to deliver an optimal user experience.
If you want to make a difference in people’s lives, you should make sure that your website clearly communicates that message. We’re passionate about helping purpose-driven organizations connect better with their ideal customers.