Your website should be evaluated regularly, and redesigned every so often to keep it performing for you. There may be many elements you want to consider when redesigning your website – looks, visibility and sales to name a few. However, there is only one thing your website really needs to do to be successful.
It needs to perform for your visitors. It can not be stressed enough that a website’s usability is the most important factor in influencing conversions. And converting visitors into clients, subscriptions and repeat visits is what you really want.
When evaluating your website for redesign, you need to take into account the way visitors are using your site, and the way in which they are arriving there. One simple thing that makes your website more user-friendly is to use valid search phrases throughout the website. Do your keyword research. Analyse data from internal search engines, ask the staff members who communicate with customers, and use keyword research tools to find out how people refer to you and your services.
If you make sure these keywords are used appropriately throughout the website, the website becomes more user-friendly and reinforces your message. Do a five-second usability test. Ask someone to look at a web page for five seconds, then write down everything they remember. If the page is keyword focussed, they should write the correct keywords down. If they don’t remember them, then the page is not focussed on the keywords enough.
This is where SEO comes in, too – this practice should make your website easier to find for those hot keywords, not to mention reinforcing the message when visitors land on a keyword focused page.
