By Tag Team Design Web Development September 10, 2014

Back in the late 90s, you were an innovator if you had a website for your business. If you still have that same website, you’re like the Dead Sea Scrolls. (Don’t laugh – we’ve seen websites for legitimate businesses that are 15+ years old!)

Today, people judge your credibility and ability to deliver on your brand promise based on your website. It should be well-designed, easy to navigate and meet the needs of your customers.

Here are 9 signs that it’s time for a website redesign:

1. It doesn’t work well on mobile
  If you’ve dug into your own website analytics lately, you’re seeing that more and more people are using their phones to browse the web. According to Smart Insights, more than 20% of Google searches are performed on a mobile device. That’s a very large number and it only continues to grow! When it comes to local searches, like looking for a restaurant or a plumber, that number grows to over 50% of the searches! If you’re a local business, it’s imperative that you get on mobile ASAP.
  Why is a mobile-friendly website important? It comes down to “user experience”. If a potential customer can’t view your website on his phone, he’s going to move onto a competitor whose site can be viewed on a mobile device. Make it easy for your customers and prospects to find you and get a website that’s “responsive”, or one that works on all devices.

1. It’s in Flash
  Flash was en vogue years ago but has been out of date for at least 5 years. Apple products like the iPhone and iPad don’t support Flash and the search engines can’t read it. This makes it terrible on multiple levels: many mobile users can’t view your site and many others can’t find your site on Google.Thankfully, technology has come a long way in the last few years. Now you can use HTML5 to create many of the animations and interactive features that used to only be available in Flash. The limitations and issues caused by Flash will only get worse. Now is the time to make the change.

1. You’re Not Converting Visitors into Customers
  If your website isn’t generating leads and/or sales through forms, white papers, phone calls and your product offerings, then it’s time to pull the trigger and get a new website. If you’re not sure, look at your analytics. If you have a high bounce rate and/or a low number of pages viewed per visit, it’s a good indication that people don’t like your website.Your design should be approached with the end in mind. Here at Tag Team, we dig into what you want your website to do for you. Some customers see it as something of an online brochure and want to generate phone calls. Others want customers to see their website as a primary resource for information about a particular product or vertical. The sales process may be longer so they want the customer to come back again and again before finally making an inquiry through an online form. Still others want visitors to take a specific action like make a purchase or make a donation. Once we understand your objective (which means you need to know what it is), you can design the website so it meets that criteria.

1. It Looks Outdated
  The web changes very quickly and so do the design trends. What was in style or “the right way” to design a website just 5 years ago is very different from what it is today. If your website was built in 2007, it will look the same way to a web user as linoleum floors and wood paneling look to someone buying a house. Even though it’s functional and nothing is “wrong” with it, it’s just outdated.A study done by ResearchGate said that 94% of people say a website with good design is more trustworthy. Obviously it’s important for customers to trust you and a good design helps that process.

1. It Takes FOR-EV-ER to load
  According to the brainiacs at KISSMetrics, 47% of customers expect a website to load within 2 seconds or less. The same study found that 40% of people will abandon your site if it takes more than 3 seconds to load!If your website is slow, you can make changes right now to improve the speed. But remember, a terrible website that loads quickly is still terrible. It may also be a sign that a new design is in order.

1. The Website No Longer Reflects Your Brand
  Have you changed your brand or your positioning in the last few years? Have you gone from an uptight-and-stuffy company to fun-and-personable? If so, it may be time to switch. Deluxe has gone through major transitions in the last few years and they’ve had to update all of their marketing assets to keep pace. Deluxe, if you don’t know, was the world’s leading producer of checks. You used to have to use checks for everything: paying rent, paying your water bill, making a car payment, paying your employees… the demand for checks was high and being the world’s leading check company meant the money came pouring in. But then society and technology shifted and checks were no longer as necessary as they once were. Some of you reading this haven’t ever written a check in your life!Deluxe had to rebrand and now bills itself as a company geared towards helping small business. Their old website was transaction-based and helped people order and reorder checks. Today’s website has a modern look and feel and reflects their new positioning in the marketplace. Have you been forced to make a similar transition as Deluxe? Has your website been updated to tell that same story?

You Can’t Update Content Easily
In the old days of web design, if you wanted to add a new page to your website, it was a cumbersome process. Not only did you have to create and upload the page but you then had to manually add it to the menu on every single page. So if you had a 10 page website and you wanted to add a new page, you had to go in and code in the new page into the menu system on all 10 pages. It was tedious work. And that was just one of the many laborious tasks there was to do! You had to know how to code the pages, how to manually upload pictures and then code them into the page and you couldn’t easily jump on and make some grammatical changes without knowing a little bit of HTML.Today websites can easily be built with a Content Management System. It allows even novice users to go in and add or edit content – from images to copy and anything in between. If you can’t easily go into the backend and edit your website, then it’s a sign that you need a new one. Up-to-date content is a critical component of today’s internet and it’s something your customers expect.

7 Signs it’s Time for a Website Redesign