Someone said a website acts like your 24/7 employee. True and this is the website that makes your potential customer’s first impression of your business. Generally, we don’t want to invest in the redesign just because we’re attached to our website, though it can perform better later-on with a design refresh. If your analytics says the different story, you get fewer emails despite the good traffic and your marketing budget doesn’t turn into remarkable ROI, you probably need a redesign.
1 – You want to add videos and still have to do it the long way
The long way means that you are doing it the pre-HMTL5 way. HTML5 means that your videos may be added or streamed with a minimal amount of effort and code. Less code means faster loading, fewer bugs and maybe even faster rendering. So, if you are still using the old way of doing things such as uploading videos, then this alone may be the only signal you need to start redesigning your website.
2 – New code for things such as social media widgets causes bugs
This is a classic symptom of an old website that needs rewriting and redesigning. The newer code is not very large. You can even install comment sections with a minimal amount of programming. If this code is causing unexpected bugs, then you need to bring your website closer to the present and give it a redesign and an update.
The bugs they cause may be silly and easy to fix but are still signs that you should redesign. For example, a bug may remove color from elements below a widget you just installed. A savvy person would just put the widget at the bottom of the page, but a smart person would write a website redesign and update.
3 – You run a W3C Markup Validation and it does badly
There are a lot of W3C markup validation services out there and some of them are free. They are handy for picking up on outdated bits of code, or redundant code. If you do rather badly on one, then you may wish to consider a rewrite so that you can create a more up to date website.
4 – It has been 2 to 5 years
You redecorate your house every few years and shop displays are changed all the time. It is okay and probably wise, to redesign your website every now and again. Between every two to five years seems suitable. Do it too often and you will put off your core consumer? Do not do it very often at all and you will start to have a website that looks dated. Furthermore, your visitors may simply get sick of the sight of it and maybe more thrilled when a competitor turns up sporting a brand new and slick website.
5 – Your brand has evolved or your logo has evolved
Do not underestimate how often brands evolve. Have a look over some of the biggest companies on the planet. Have a look at how often the cola logo has changed, or the Pepsi one (especially). Look at what Apple’s logo used to look like. Even the boxes of McDonalds fries have changed in both design and logo. Your brand will evolve as time goes on. As your brand evolves, then so should your website. Your web design should change to suit your consumer demand and your website design.
6 – Your website is slow to load
This is probably because you are using a lot more code than you need to. It may also be because you have updated over a number of years and have picked up a lot of code baggage. There are a number of reasons why your website is running slowly, but a common one is because it has become outdated and needs a redesign.
7 – You run a compatibility test and it fails badly
There are debugging tests all over the place these days. It is possible to run compatibility tests for a very low price. Your website may need a redesign if it is having trouble working on a lot of different platforms. There are some tools that work better with browsers such as Firefox over IE, and vice versa, so it is okay if your website does not fair perfectly on all of them. But, there are a lot of platforms out there, from the various desktop browsers to mobile devices and such. If your website looks more like a desktop IE exclusive website, then it may be time for a change.