Redesigning a website may be filled with thrill. Who doesn't like new aesthetics, updated content, and a much more user-friendly site? However, many companies often miss one crucial step before plunging into the colour schemes, layouts, and new features: actually auditing the present website.
To put it simply, a redesign of a website without the audit is akin to remodelling a house without inspecting the foundation. You end up repairing unnecessarily fixed things, while the real problems remain unattended. A website audit lays the groundwork for the redesign that is insight-driven, not a shot in the dark, by giving you the idea of what's working and what needs fixing.
Here we discuss, with the help of a website designing company, how to effectively audit your website before jumping into a redesign.
In this article, we explore how to effectively audit your website before a redesign, guided by the expertise of a web design company.
Be Clear About Your Website Goals
Rather than rushing into technical analysis, you should first figure out a simple but essential answer to the question, why does this website exist?
Is it lead generation, product sales, reputation building, user education, or client service that your website is programmed for? Companies evolve their products and services while seldom updating their websites accordingly, so your site might be a mismatch for your current business goals.
List down your major goals and evaluate your website strategy against them. One of the key signs of a misalignment is when your business objective is lead generation but your website is all about storytelling without a clear path for conversion. Recognizing this discrepancy will provide an initial direction for your redesign.
Dig into Your Website Analytics
Arguments or disputes aside, data prove to be the best allies of a website audit. Analytics tell the truth of how users are engaging your site; the truth might differ from your assumptions.
Begin your investigation by finding out where the traffic is coming from. Next, get into the details of bounce rate, average session duration, and pages per session. If a web page is going quite well in terms of traffic but users aren’t engaging much, it might be a question of content or layout. Low-traffic pages might require you to work on their visibility, or they may just be merged or removed.
Don’t forget to pinpoint your best-performing pages as well. These pages should not be tampered with during the redesign unless proper analysis has been done. Without realizing what makes these pages work, you could end up damaging your results by either removing or drastically altering them.
Look Into User Experience and Navigation
Whether a visitor is going to stay or not heavily depends on the website's user experience feature. Try to look at your site as a visitor would instead of as the business owner.
Test the accessibility of your site navigation. Is the menu system logical? Is the route to key information short and straightforward? If you still are puzzled after visiting your web page, chances are so are your users.
In addition, consider other details such as page designs, fonts, font sizes, proper use of spaces, and colour options. If the style is overloaded or poorly structured, it makes it difficult for the users. Analyze your users' experience and feedback to discover their confusing or frustrating points, as these will be those areas that you will mainly focus on during your redesign.
Consider Changes to Conversion Paths and CTAs
A website should encourage a user to take a certain action. It can be the interpretation of a form, a purchase, or even the communication with your team.
Review your calls to action and conversion paths. Are CTAs easily found and understood? Are they appropriate to the user’s goals? Do you think forms are too lengthy or too complicated?
Discover the stage where users leave the conversion process. If your service pages are visited without any action, you might have the problem of unclear messaging, weak CTAs, or poor layout.
Your website redesign should target the strengthening of such paths, while the audit reveals the exact points for improvements.
Collect User Feedback
Sometimes your own internal analysis might not be sufficient. The feedback from end-users, who are the actual users, often provides totally new insights to you.
Communicate with customers, team members, or stakeholders who are most likely to use the website frequently. Find out what they consider confusing, what they like and if there is anything they find difficult.
Even if the honesty is only partial, the feedback might be enough to uncover some problems that have been going on and to approve the changes that you want to be made during the redesign.
Keep a Record of All Before You Going On
When the audit is done, present all your discoveries in a single document.
Point out the good points that you want to keep, the bad that should be corrected, and the potential that you can tap into.
This paper serves as the ground for your redesign brief. It guarantees that designers, developers, and copywriters move in the same direction and thus avoids unnecessary changes in the later stages of the process.
If the audit is thoroughly recorded, there is a substantial saving of time and cost and also less frustration, and it is a redesign that actually generates results.
Locate Technical Defects and Glitches
Technical issues may be largely invisible, but they are likely to cause a major drop in the performance and user satisfaction. While conducting your audit, go through the checks for any broken links, missing pages, wrong redirects, and error messages.
Check not just the consistency but also the cleanliness of your URLs. Both users and search engines can get confused by awkward structures. Your website might have sunk into a state of abandonment if it has been updated several times without any proper maintenance. The result can be an unnecessary buildup of old and irrelevant pages and features.
When you document these problems, you prevent them from being transferred to the newly designed website.
Some Final Thoughts
The decision to audit your present website before a redesign is not an option but an imperative. It provides you with the understanding, the road map, and the assurance that you are taking the right steps.
Rather than directing your redesign by your own assumptions or following the trends, an audit is the weapon that guards you with real data, user behaviour, and business goals. The outcome is a website not only better visually but also better-performing, better-converting and supportive of sustainable growth.
A comprehensive audit taken through the help of professionals from FODUU turns website redesign from a mere skin-deep update into a strategic move.
A comprehensive audit taken through the help of a professional web design India team from FODUU turns website redesign from a mere skin-deep update into a strategic move.
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