It was a tricky and timely process, but we finally got
there… Our new website is finished! And we learned a lot along the way. Here
are six tips to consider when revamping your company’s website.
1.
Create 3-5 “benefit statements”
Before you start diving into color schemes,
background images, and all that fun stuff, create 3-5 “benefit statements.”
These are things that you want people to “take away” after visiting your site.
Your audience needs to understand what benefits you bring to the table and they
need to gain an understanding of this within the first couple minutes of
visiting your site. Questions to ponder when creating benefit statements:
o
What can we do that no other company can?
o
Why choose us over a competitor?
o
What misconceptions do people have about our
company?
o
What has made our company thrive?
2. Consider ALL of your audiences
As a market research company, we have many
different audiences looking at our site. We have repeat clients, potential
clients, current research participants, and others who are “information
seekers.” You need to make sure your site caters to all audiences’ needs. Along
with that, think about what your site is doing for each of your audiences, and
make it easy for them to find what they need.
3. Don’t throw out the baby with the bath water
Your old website was perfect at one point
in time, so there are still some good pieces of it that can be worked into the
new site. Much of our content was the same, so we used a lot of the old wordage
and just updated it and organized it better.
4. Incorporate social media
Having a social media presence on your
website is crucial. Regardless of how many Likes or Followers you have, the
social aspect on your website makes your company look modern and easily
accessible. Add the social media icons on to your site or add a feed if you are
frequently posting updates. To better promote your online brand, your social
sites and your website should work seamlessly.
5. Ask your colleagues for feedback!
You can get a totally different perspective
if you look from the outside-in. After looking at your website over and over,
you may be blind to some things that others see when they go on to your site.
Asking colleagues for their input about your current site will help in the
development of the new website, and will give you better insight into what your
audience actually sees when they are
on the site.
6. Consider where your audience will be accessing
your site from – laptop, tablet, mobile phone, etc.
Everyone is on-the-go today and going online
in many different ways. This is plain and simple: Make sure your website can be
easily viewed and read from all
mobile devices.
