You like your site, and it serves a purpose to your business – great! But do you LOVE it? Could it do with a few updates and additions? According to those in tech-land (a real place, you guys), the general life-cycle of a website is three years. This means, every three years, your site could do with a refresh, or if it’s been longer, perhaps a full redesign.
Here’s what you can do to your site at the three year point to keep your most valuable digital asset up-to-date and on-trend – with all the trimmings of a successfully converting website.
Graphics
This is probably the first thing you notice when you visit a site. If your site is a decade old, your graphics will give you away instantly. The overall visual design of your site is probably the area of your site that bugs you the most. Am I right?
When you engage with a professional (ahem – like the legends at SGD), you will go through a site plan, so you can restructure your site first. Once you are happy with this, the visuals will be drawn up to bring your site to life. Generally you will be provided with a few samples and from there it’s a joint partnership between you and the graphics department to make sure the site oozes your personality and sets you apart from the competition.
Images
Whether you’re selling products, a service, or an idea, you may want to refresh your imagery every few years or sooner. Trends in styling change often, as do the trends in photography. We recommend hiring a professional photographer for any flat-lay produce, architectural, and/or food shots. If you really want to nail it, a stylist specific to your field (ie food sylist, fashion stylist etc) combined with a professional photographer will have you onto a winner. While it can be costly, if your website is the main source of revenue for your business, it will be worth it.
Another area to look at is your staff imagery. A uniform, up-to-date team page is ideal – don’t let this get too out-of-date. Go for a style that is easily replicated for when you experience staff turn-over. This should be an area you can update yourself.
Fonts
With the revolving door of popular font-trends, it can be super hard to keep up. Thankfully, this isn’t the hardest update your site will go through. A professional web designer can help you pick the best to suite your personality, while keeping you up-to-date with the trends. It’s always a good idea to choose a font and style that won’t date your site, to ensure it lasts you another three years.
Copywriting
When you created your site, you may have been so caught up with the look and feel of your design that the wording became an afterthought – or perhaps it was whipped up by someone in the business, but not a professional? It’s super common. But, boy do we have news for you! The words on your website are just as important as the visuals (yep, those guys in tech-land just confirmed it), so if you’re thinking of doing a redesign, have a think about rewriting your content too. You may want to look at a few things before starting, like tone (this has a huge impact on your online persona), and ofcourse spelling and grammar. Having a professional proof-read your site before it goes live is invaluable.
Lastly, this is also a chance to give your SEO a real boost!
Worthy Additions
There are so many ways to enhance your site without going the full hog. The team at SGD specialise in updating all of your copy and visual needs, as well as the following add-ons:
- E-newsletter – stay front-of-mind with your potential clients by keeping in touch with regular news and product updates.
- Blog – want to stay in touch with your visitors and manage it all by yourself? We can set you up with an easily updated blog and add it to your existing site. It’s super easy.
- Shopping cart – thinking about taking your business online, in a sales sense? There are lots of ways to add e-commerce to your site, and this is the most profitable by a mile. We recommend getting a professional to photograph all inventory, and we can set you up will all of the tools to upload your items at your own leisure.
- Online bookings – want to minimise admin time and create an online booking system? Online booking systems can be used for medical centres, restaurants and so much more. This has been proven to increase bookings across all industries – simply by eliminating the need to call! You can also add SMS or email reminders and confirmations to this service, again minimising the tasks for admin staff.
Want to take your site to the next level and see your sales soar? Let’s do it! Contact us today to arrange a free 30 minute brainstorming session.
