These days, an audience’s attention span is very short – people Google your business before they do anything else. A well-designed, easy-to-use website helps get visitors to your site and keeps them interested once they get there. If your website has poor design, it can hurt your traffic and business.
Our guide below will help ensure your website is up to date.
Make a Good Impression Fast
Nostalgia for the ’90s may be at an all-time high, but your website shouldn’t be stuck there. Older designs are often cluttered, hard to navigate and don’t work well on mobile devices. If your website looks like it’s from the ’90s, it shows you’re not interested in staying current. If you want to be known as a lead expert in your industry – having an outdated website doesn’t send that message. Your website is like anything else: It needs to stay on track of what’s trending.
Your Competitors Did It
If your competition has redesigned their sites, then so should you. Take a good look at what they’ve done – don’t copy what they did, but take notes on some key things that make their website more attractive or what they’re focusing on. But most importantly, think about what aspects your customers are looking for the most.
Too Much Text?
If your website has more text than visuals, then it’s probably outdated. A ‘wall of text’ can be overwhelming and might steer customers away from important buttons. If there’s a lot of text, your message might not get across due to it simply not being read. Consider using less text but more engaging language and differing font weights to distinguish what is most important and draw attention.
Easy to Navigate?
You want your audience to find specific pages quickly and easily. Common pages include;
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About Us – what your company does
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Services and Products – what your company offers
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Contact Us or Book Now – who to contact / how to book in
Think about what your “call-to-action” is. Do you want the audience to sign up for your newsletter? Buy a product? Download an ebook? Make sure it’s clear – and make that path simple, smooth and appealing. If visitors can’t find your products / information / contacts or anything else they’re looking for – they’re likely to leave the site for a competitor.
It can also create issues with Google searches. Google depends on a page’s structure and information to determine how it fits into the complete website’s purpose. The simpler it is for Google to find your site and decipher it, the most likely it is to show up in search engine searches. Otherwise, you can end up with low conversion rates.
Slow Load Times?
One of the most frustrating issues for customers is slow load times. A good functioning website should load in 3 seconds or less. If your website isn’t loading fast enough, it’s time to figure out why. Whether it’s images not loading correctly, or something else, you’ll need to resolve the issue to get back on track. You may need to scale back the amount of content you display on your pages (especially your homepage) and remove any unnecessary filler, whether it’s content or aesthetic design elements like animation or background images.
Another aspect to consider is what’s under your website’s hood, as this can often be the quickest way to speed your website up. The engine, nuts and bolts of your website can often become outdated simply due to advancing technology. It can be challenging for web hosts and developers to keep on top of your server hardware and web tools, so choosing to review this every year is a good practice to make sure everything is optimised as efficiently as possible. All it may need is an upgrade to a new framework or high performing server.
Fixing Bad Experiences
Creating better user experiences starts with your updates. Considering a proper maintenance plan can ensure that your website is always performing at its peak.
To recap:
People will leave your site in seconds if:
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Your website doesn’t clearly represent your products / services.
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Visitors can’t find what they want.
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It takes too long to load.
As a rule of thumb, your website should be:
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Easy to find
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Easy on the eyes
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Easy to navigate
When did you last look at your current website? Has it been a few years? If so, you might want to think about giving it a makeover. Contact us today to learn how our web design services can help your business, and help you keep things Simple.
