Website redesigning is one of the lesser-known facts of the modern web designing industry. With proper execution, you can use website redesigning to increase your website’s user experience and ultimately turn your business into a massive profit.
However, if you cannot conduct the process correctly, it can turn into a massive failure. Thus, we recommend that companies conduct proper planning and market research to transform the designing project into a massive success.
In this article, we will discuss the crucial steps that every company must follow in the entire project. Before we discuss the process, let’s talk about the circumstances that indicate the need for a redesign.
Indications for the Need for a Redesign
Before you invest your valuable time and resources into the redesigning project, you must ensure that you are conducting this process at the right time. For instance, you shouldn’t change a website’s visuals to compete with competitors or for any other vague reason. In case your site continues to attract customers and provides profit, then there is no need to make any changes to it. You must rely on the website analytics to identify the perfect time for redesigning it in simple words.
Now, let us discuss a few factors that might be considered to be the perfect wake up call for website redesigning:
- Lack of mobile optimization.
- Change in the business goals since the launch of the website.
- Outdated Branding on the present website interface.
- Errors in the core functioning of the website.
- The website fails to convert business leads.
Website redesign Checklist every designer must-have.
Based on the above portion’s points, you can determine that the website needs a redesign or not. Additionally, these points will also act as the foundation stones for the strategy of the designing project.
Now let us take a look at the crucial point that you must consider for the project:
Step 1: Create a team of Stakeholders of the website
Before you start the discussions for designing the website, you must create a dedicated team that will oversee the entire project. A dedicated team will help to increase the progress of the redesigning project. Additionally, you must ensure that you choose the members from different departments of a company. It will help to execute the various stages of the redesigning project properly. Additionally, you can get valuable feedback from people with different points of view. The leader of the dedicated team will have the final say for all approvals and decision-making processes. This will ultimately ensure steady progress for the entire project and its timely completion.
Step 2: Create an Audit for the Current Site
In this process, you need to create a strategy for the entire redesigning project. An adequately designed plan will have a vital role in the success of the entire project. An in-depth audit of the current website will be the first point to create a strategy for the redesigning project. This audit will give you an overall view of all the areas that you need to work on to improve the website’s performance. Additionally, you can find all the errors and functionality issues that are currently harming your website’s potential.
Let us discuss a few points that you must include in the final audit of the website:
- Overall Performance in terms of traffic.
- Complete an SEO Audit for the current Website.
- Take a look at the critical content of the website.
Step 3: Have an understanding of the Journey of the User.
The user’s journey will help you understand the various stages a customer goes through before purchasing on your website. It will help you understand the various emotions and reactions your user might face at every stage of the process. You must consider all these points to find the various factors that need to be fixed to make your website successful. Additionally, you can collect feedback from your current customers to understand how they feel about the present state of the website and all the areas that they want reform in. In simple terms, your final goal is to create a design that provides a smooth experience to all users who will be accessing your website.
You can also collect vital data from various analytical tools that can help you understand the present reach of your website content.
Step 4: Set the Vital Goals
As we already discussed earlier, there are few reasons for which you will be redesigning your website. So, in this portion, we have to discover all this reason and set some specific goals. There is a lot of time and effort that you need to invest in a website designing project. Thus, it is very crucial to ensure the success of the entire effort. Depending on all the factors you discovered in the audit, you need to find those areas that need improvement or any different changes. For instance, you might discover that your website isn’t having the required amount of traffic. In this case, you can set a goal of increasing traffic for the website by at least 1%.
Step 5: Create your redesign Strategy
Now that you are finished having a complete understanding of the current website status, you have to create a strategy to improve and renovate it. You must include all the changes and additions in this strategy to ensure smooth progress in the redesigning project.
So, let us discuss all the factors that you must include in this plan:
- A new Sitemap for the entire website
- An ideal flow of users on every webpage
- Research the keywords to make your website search optimized.
- Set a timeline for the completion of the entire project.
Step 6: Review and Update the Guide for your Brand Style
As a designer, you must remember that the brand style is one of the essential tools a company has. In case you don’t possess a brand style for a company, this is the perfect time to create a new one. In simple terms, a brand is the first thing people will think about when they see your company’s name or logo. It must be a representation of your business and Company structure.
The brand style guide will ensure that you can communicate with customers and relate a positive message about your business. This guide will help you make a company understandable and relatable for all the people in the market. This is why this process is critical before you begin the redesigning of the website. There are two significant factors that you must consider to ensure that your company’s brand style is updated:
- Content Brand Style
- Visual Brand Style
Step 7: Gather Inspiration and Reach on your Competitors
Now that you completed the route map for the redesigning project, it is time to think about the website’s new design. It would help if you considered a few of your competitor websites to understand what you have been missing out on. Take a look at websites from different businesses to get an understanding of the latest market trends. After you have gathered all the information, you need to discuss the vital points with your redesigning team. It is essential to maintain a uniform reasoning view. Thus, you can ensure that all the actions of the team are entirely synchronized. So, this will ultimately help to align the overall goals of the entire project.
Step 8: Start the Designing Process
Designing is the best part of the entire process as you finally get to turn your weeks of hard work into reality. It is an excellent measure to start the process slowly and make sure that you get constant feedback from other redesigning team members. You can use various tools for the designing process to ensure steady and efficient progress in the project. The creation of a Wireframe is the best way to start the process. In most cases, you can choose simple Black and White designs. Thus, you will be able to show your content on every webpage prominently. Additionally, wireframes will allow you to stay focused on the website design and make the content prominently visible.
Step 9: Launch the New Website
Launching is the final process in the redesigning project. After spending many months planning, designing, and developing your website, you are finally ready to launch your new website. However, it is essential to conduct a pre-launch review of the website before you launch it to your end-users. It will help you ensure that everything on your website is in the correct position and you are ready to go.
Now let’s take a look at some of the things that you must consider in this checklist:
- Check for any errors in the website links.
- Ensure that all the redirect applications are working correctly.
- Verify that all the media content is working correctly.
- Ensure that the descriptions and meta descriptions are correct for every webpage
Tools to Test the New Design of the Website
Various tools help you to test your website before you finally launch it. For instance, you have to ensure that your website is responsive. This process will ensure that all your users can access it on various devices and browsers.
● LT Browser
LT browser is a great tool which allows you to test the responsiveness of your application on different devices. You can conduct this process in a side by side view. Additionally, the mirror interaction feature allows you to check the responsiveness of your website on mobile devices. This application allows you to thoroughly test a website with the help of various ports and devices. Moreover, you can use the live tracking feature to keep an active note of all the testing environment processes. Thus, we can conclude that the LT browser is the best option to test a website’s responsiveness on various devices.
The Verdict
We can justify that website redesigning can be a very fruitful process. However, you must conduct it in the right manner. Various companies redesign their websites on a timely basis to keep up with the recent market trends. As a website designer, you must create a responsive and accessible website on all devices and browsers.