EVALUATE ITS EFFECTIVENESS WITH THIS HELPFUL WEBSITE CHECKLIST.
Wondering whether a website redesign should be part of your budget? Before you declare your current dot com DOA, take a moment to determine if it’s pulling its weight by driving traffic and raising revenue. To help, we’ve put together this website analysis checklist based on over two decades of experience developing and redesigning websites that help clients move sales in the right direction.
Taking a moment to consider the following indicators of an effective website will help you determine the difference between needing a major overhaul and making a few incremental improvements.
ASK YOURSELF, DOES MY WEBSITE…
Contain effective sales funnels
What are sales funnels? They are pages, content, and calls-to-action that draw visitors to your site, “funnel” them down the sales chain, and convert them into leads or paying customers. Funnels require a comprehensive understanding of your customers and their stressors, and the know-how to build a site that will connect them to solutions in seconds. If your site isn’t properly funneling visitors to the answers they seek quickly, then chances are they will become frustrated and look elsewhere.
Align with my brand
Is the look of your site consistent with your marketing collateral? Does the tone and style of the content match your brand persona? If not, you have some work to do. To build awareness, trust, and loyalty with customers, every interaction they have with your brand should consistently embody the promise, values, and look and feel of your brand.
Pass the speed test
There’s no substitute for speed. Today’s world moves at an ever-accelerating pace and if your site doesn’t keep up, users will grow impatient and depart for greener, more responsive shores. A 4-5 second load time is acceptable, but anything longer needs a fix. Want to see how your site measures up? Visit webpagetest.org to test your site’s load time and host of additional criteria.
Look great on all devices
According to statistics from SimilarWeb, nearly 60% of all web searches are made on mobile devices. To compete, your website needs to include responsive design, meaning that it not only functions on most mobile phones and tablets, but also looks good doing so. This easy mobile-friendly testing tool from Google allows you to see how your site looks on a variety of screen sizes and in various formats.
Convert visitors into leads
Whether it’s registering for an account, making a purchase, or signing up for an email newsletter, conversion simply means that a visitor to your website takes an action that you want them to take. To test to see if your site is conversion optimized, isolate a single important component within an action-oriented page—the phrasing in a call-to-action, an image, a design element, etc.—and change it. After two to four weeks, measure the results against the old version and adjust accordingly. Continue to experiment until you reach your conversion goal. Do the same for additional pages and you’ll notice a significant increase in conversion rates.
If you can say that your website meets all of the criteria here in our website analysis checklist, then relax. Your website doesn’t need a major redesign – yet. Remember that your website should be evaluated every year to ensure its evolving and helping your business boom. Be sure to read our next blog post on ways you can take your website to the next level.
If you can’t check these items off your list, it may be time to consider a website redesign. Contact our experienced Madison-area digital marketing specialists for expert website development and integrated marketing strategy and implementation.
