There can be any number of reasons that you are considering a website. You may just be feeling the need for a total refresh of your site, you feel your overall business image is a little outdated, or you have noticed that web design has changed, and you want to see your site caught up to new practices.

Whatever the reason, a website redesign is a perfect opportunity to breathe new life into your website and your business. A website redesign can have a big impact on your business – from serving as the place potential customers are first interacting with your brand to being the deciding factor in a purchasing decision.

Before diving fully into a website redesign, there are a few basic things that you can keep in mind as you get started. Below, we dig into several of these important website redesign tips that are key to keep in mind as you get started.

Website Redesign Tips to Keep in Mind

The following website redesign tips from Split Reef website design company will help give you a strong starting point as you look to update and refresh your website – no matter the kind of individual needs you may have.

Determine Your Redesign Goals

You cannot get into a total website redesign without at least a few specific goals in mind. Determining your goals before you get started in the actual process of your website redesign will help you lay out exactly what it is you want out of the redesign.

So set aside some specific time that you can dedicate to laying out your redesign goals. This can involve answering several questions such as:

• Why are you redesigning your website? Are there any primary reasons?
• What do you want the end result to look like?
• What kind of return on investment do you expect from this redesign?
• Are there any new features like a contact form, product pages, or other relevant elements you want included in?
• What is your top goal for your website?
• What kind of experience do you want users to have on your site?

Answering these kinds of questions helps to focus your ideas and needs for your website into attainable goals that will help the team working on your website redesign in understanding what you want.

Perform a Website Audit

A website audit is essentially a process where you or the team you are working with will go through everything on your website to fully assess the content and site itself. This will provide you with insight into what exactly is on your website and what may need to be redone.

Insights you will receive from a website audit include:

• What search engine optimization you already have and what you could benefit from
• Old, outdated content that needs to be updated
• An understanding of the user experience and areas where it could be improved like navigation bars, slow loading times, and where there is too much information being thrown at users
• Broken links
• How your website is ranking in search engines

Much like setting goals will help guide your redesign, a website audit will provide you with an important understanding of how your content and website is performing and how easy it is for users to use.

Research Your Target Audience

Even if you already have a decent understanding of your target audience, a website redesign is the perfect opportunity to update your defined audience. Just as your website needs change over time, so does your audience’s needs.

Researching your target audience’s needs can help provide further insight into what kind of user experience they may expect and benefit from on your website as well.

Your research should answer questions like:

• What are your audience’s browsing style and habits?
• What kind of information are they looking for?
• What are you looking to sell or advertise to users?
• How is your audience searching for you and other similar websites, businesses, and information?

Understanding your audience will allow you to ensure that your business, branding, and website align with who you want to connect with.

Consider Mobile-Friendly Design

With over 50% of online traffic originating from mobile devices in 2022, it’s fair to say that having a mobile friendly design is important for any website. As you redesign your website, ensuring that your website is properly formatted for mobile devices will be key.

Having a mobile friendly design ensures that users who are visiting your site on mobile devices like smartphones and tablets can just as easily view and engage with your site as desktop visitors can. 

Mobile friendly design includes making sure that a site is formatted properly for a mobile device in all aspects from layout and navigation to loading times.

Optimize Your Content with SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a key part of any website redesign. It is what allows your content and website to be seen through organic search results, pulling visitors to your website as they search for information.

As you redesign your website, SEO will be found across your website. It will feature in both landing pages and blogs that are providing visitors information about your business and what you do, but it will also appear in areas like:

• Photo and video captions
• Subtitles
• Alt text
• Product and service descriptions
• Page titles
• Meta descriptions

Good, solid SEO will drastically impact how your website ranks in search engines like Google. 

And with Google as the most frequently used search engine worldwide, understanding the impact of SEO has never been more important as you redesign your website.

And with that, these are some of the most important website redesign tips around. The redesign process can be an intimidating one, but it’s well worth the time and investment that it will take to give your website a well-deserved facelift.

Jacksonville web design company that takes an innovative approach to each and every project they take on. With a team of unmatched experts in the website design and digital marketing space, Split Reef brings cutting edge knowledge to the table. With an understanding that each client’s needs differ, their full suite of services ranges from professional search engine optimization, social media, and digital marketing to website redesigns. As a top-rated Jacksonville web design company, Split Reef’s years of experience are ready to be at your disposal.