You’ll find plenty of answers, but they won’t always be convenient. Luckily, you won’t always have to rely on your gut when guessing how often you need to upgrade your website. Consider the following when deciding whether or not it’s time for a change.
Older advice would say every three to five years, and if anything, you’re better off using that as a starting point. Some websites hold up nicely at the five year mark, if the site is loading quickly and is optimised for the modern mobile landscape. Other websites, designed two years ago, can be so outdated that they’re unfit for use at the current state of a business.
When weighing the following signs, a full redesign is in order. Is your business growing but your website doesn’t show it? Have your competitors surpassed your website’s design? Does your website have issues that impact your business negatively, and will not be fixed just by slapping together some quick band-aid solutions? Lastly, design and development should drive traffic to your website and help fulfill your goals. If your website is showing declining metrics with growing users, a full redesign should be done to remedy these issues.
Most people don’t consider that many of the problems they identify requiring a full redesign are actually issues that can be addressed through targeted updates. Outdated content, obsolete testimonials, broken links, and a homepage that fails to feature the appropriate call to action, to name just a few examples, are refreshes, not redesigns. A full redesign is a significant investment of both time and money, and opting for a full redesign when the actual issues are of a relatively small and easier to address nature is a waste of resources dealing with the wrong issues.
We strongly suggest that you think of “redesign” and “refresh” as separate options. You should be doing a thorough assessment of your site at least every year, But, do be aware, a quick drive-by assessment of the homepage is not a thorough assessment. You should be checking site speed, mobile usability, the content to ensure it is still accurate and the business, and the site still functions as it should to convert customers. Most of the time the feedback you get from that assessment will entail a few small changes. Every few years it could lead to a major change.
The companies who get the most out of their sites see their sites as a long-term investment. They take a constant care and improvement approach, regular small changes, as opposed to waiting a long time, five to ten years in some cases, before an expensive, and disruptive, full redesign is done. You’ll know if you are due for a full redesign before you start losing customers.