If you’ve been using the internet for a few years, you probably remember the days when text flashed like a flashlight, traffic counters that looked like car speedometers, “under construction” signs, and automatically playing midi music files when a web page loaded. All of this was commonplace back then.
Your business website may not be as old as the above features from that era, but that doesn't mean it doesn't definitely need a refresh. Below we will see what are the 5 signs that you need a new website.
1. It is not mobile-friendly Responsive)
By responsive, we don’t just mean mobile-friendly. We mean mobile-first. Because more and more people are browsing websites on their smartphones, Google now looks at the mobile version of your website in many ways and algorithms to determine its ranking. If Google is putting more emphasis on your website’s mobile presence, then you should too. Unfortunately, most small businesses are taking the opposite approach.
When you’re at work, you’re probably using a computer. When you’re writing a blog post or browsing your website, you’re probably also using a computer. Your experience with your website is primarily through a computer, so it’s easy to get into the mindset that the desktop version is what matters and the mobile version is just an extra feature that’s nice to have.
If your website isn’t responsive, in other words, if the same design appears on desktops, laptops, and mobile devices, you should have updated your website yesterday! (And since yesterday isn’t possible, unless you have a time machine, the update should be coming soon.) You owe it to your customers to have a usable website. No one wants to have to constantly zoom in and out of text, scroll left and right to read sentences that don’t fit on the screen, or try to figure out how to navigate a website where clicking on a menu option always takes you to a different page than the one they wanted.
Even if you have a mobile-friendly website, it may not be as usable on mobile devices as it should be, especially if it was designed a few years ago. Best practices have changed, and so have user expectations. Use Google’s mobile-friendly website checker to see if your website is truly responsive by today’s standards. Still not sure? Ask people you know to view your business’s website on their phones and give you their honest opinion.
Many of you may be asking: “Almost none of my website traffic comes from mobile devices. Why should I optimize my website for mobile?”
Well, this could be because your website is not optimized for mobile devices and is almost non-existent on them. There is no excuse or reason not to have a mobile responsive website. None!
2. It's Difficult to Navigate
Some web designers focus more on appearance than usability. The result is often websites that are difficult, if not impossible, to navigate. (But at least they look pretty, you'll be excused!)
Let's look at some common errors we see in navigation issues below:
- A blog without the ability to view or navigate to older articles.
- The navigation is not optimized for mobile devices, making the menu options difficult to read and select.
- Repeated menu options.
- Too many menu options.
- Few menu options.
- The menu in the mobile version is unresponsive or not displayed.
- Drop-down menus that don't work properly.
3. It Looks Outdated
If you feel embarrassed or disappointed at the thought of someone you know visiting your business website, then you probably know that it looks bad. Your website is the first interaction that many, if not most, customers have with your business, and if it leaves a bad impression, you've lost them from the start.
In other cases, you may not be aware that your website looks outdated. Maybe you’ve gotten so used to the way it looks that it’s hard to look at it and evaluate it objectively. This is another case where we recommend asking people you trust to give you honest feedback. Surely you all have some people around you who call things by their real names!
The general rule is that a website should be updated aesthetically approximately every 2-3 years and technically every 1-2 years. You should always keep in mind that updating your website is important for security and functionality reasons and not just for aesthetic reasons.
Other signs that your website is visually outdated include:
- Color combinations that were a market trend years ago, but not so much today.
- Small images. Modern web design incorporates larger, higher-quality images because computers and mobile devices can handle increased bandwidth on internet connections.
- An exaggerated, garish design as opposed to an elegant, simple and minimalist one.
- Your competitors have much better websites than you (and in retrospect, that frustrates you).
You may think an outdated website isn’t a big deal, but it’s the same as if your restaurant had stains on the tablecloths and chairs or if your doctor’s waiting room had dirty walls with heavy signs of wear. It sends the message that you don’t really care about the impression you make.
4. It Doesn't Fulfill Its Purpose
Some businesses seem to have websites just to say they have one! When you have a business, you need a website and you need the best one! But it’s not enough to just have an online presence. Your website has a purpose, and that purpose is to promote your business.
One sign that your website is not fulfilling its purpose is if it has a high bounce rate. Bounce rate is a metric that appears in Google Analytics that measures the number of visitors who come to your website and leave without navigating to another page because they don’t find your website engaging enough. While it’s understandable that some pages will have a higher bounce rate than others, if this is something that is observed across all of your content pages, it’s a sign that something is wrong with your website!
Another sign that your website isn’t helping your business grow is if your conversion rate is low. It’s great to have visitors to your website, but you want to convert those visits into money. You may need to add clearer calls to action (CTAs), improved navigation, content that’s better aligned with your digital advertising messages, or a combination of all of these.
Finally, if your website is not getting any traffic from Google Search, or at least very little of it, then again your website is not fulfilling its purpose. Low search engine traffic can be due to a number of factors, including the structure of your website. For example, if your website does not have separate, optimized pages for each of your products and services, this is something you can fix with a website redesign.
5. It Doesn't Work Well
Google research has shown that most people will abandon a website if it doesn’t load within 3 seconds. If your website is slow, you’re likely to lose potential customers to the competition. Plus, Google uses website loading speed as a ranking factor, so a slow website can hurt your business in multiple ways.
Your website may load, but it’s full of errors, broken links, images that don’t load/display properly, text that doesn’t align/display properly. Not only are these annoying to users, but they’re also another sign that you don’t pay attention to detail. You don’t want people to leave with the impression that you don’t care or pay attention to the details about your business.
Some business owners try to solve these problems piecemeal, which can work, but if your website is old, it usually makes more sense to build a completely new and modern website. A website can only be updated and fixed with piecemeal solutions up to a point, before it becomes technically impossible after a few years.
Conclusion
If you read all the reasons above and suspect it's time to get a new website for your business, you're probably right!
Need help and guidance with developing your new website? The MediaBranch team develops custom websites for your business that include mobile-first design, SEO tools, and the latest features that customers expect from your website.
Click here to receive a financial offer from us for your business's new website or e-shop.
