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What if I told you that a WordPress website redesign can help you increase conversions? How you present information online builds your brand, authenticity, and trust.
If you’re considering a WordPress website redesign, here is what you should remember.
First, let’s consider why you should redesign your WordPress site.
There are several reasons you can move forward with redesigning WordPress. Here is a list with brief descriptions.
Why a WordPress Website Redesign?
Speed matters
Redesigning WordPress can help you improve page speed optimization. Chances are, you’ve built your site with outdated routines or tools; redesigning can help you move the needle and reduce load times.
Manual coding vs CMS
In manual coding, developers must ensure the site is responsive to all devices, such as desktops, tablets, and hand-held devices.
On the other hand, a CMS helps you automatically build responsive websites.
For example, WordPress themes and templates are responsive by default, helping users reduce costs, developmental routines, and time while striving to create fast-loading pages.
User experience
To convert well, you must ensure the user experience is up to the mark for the target audience.
User experience helps users experience your site, product, and search intent. Your site’s user experience is fair enough if the end user is satisfied.
If the redesigned site is user-friendly and the web design is good, conversions increase daily. In this case, you only have to drive more organic traffic, and the number of conversions will increase.
Personal preference
You could redesign WordPress because:
- The current look is not appealing enough and needs a website redesign.
- You don’t like how your site is built, displays information, or is organized.
So, beyond technical reasons for a WordPress website redesign, personal preference matters – too.
Things to Consider (WordPress Website Redesign)
Backup first
Before making any changes, you must take your site’s Backup.
A backup plan helps you:
- Secure your site’s current position, also known as backup packages. These packages include your site’s database, themes, plugins, uploads, and other data.
- A backup plan helps you restore WordPress if something goes wrong. For example, if your site’s redesigning goes wrong somehow, you can revert to the previous version of your WordPress website, all by restoring the backup packages.
There are several plugins you can use to take WordPress backups. UpDraft Plus or Duplicator are two options.
The plugins provide a no-code interface to help you take WordPress backups.
Once installed, you can proceed and click on the Backup Now button. Once the process has finished, you can download the ZIP packages to the local disk.
Website stats
Take redesigning WordPress as an A/B test against the new design.
Note down the following key points and metrics from the old site before you initiate the redesign process.
- How many users is your site getting daily, and what is the bounce rate with Google Analytics?
- The conversion rates for landing pages, contact forms, or sales, if ecommerce.
- Note the speed of WordPress pages and posts with GT Metrix.
- See the level of responsiveness for the current WordPress pages, custom layouts, and blog posts.
Once you have finished your WordPress website redesign, you can compare the stats before and after the redesigning process and see if the process improved the above stats. This helps you perform A/B testing on WordPress and provides informed information for future digital marketing.
Website SEO audit
Website audit is a broad concept. During this process, admins can improve WordPress by considering as many factors as possible.
Here is what a typical step-by-step website audit includes:
- A content audit helps admins see if the content is converting well enough. By content, we mean the pages and posts published on WordPress. The content gap is also measured to see if targeting untapped opportunities can help compared to competitors.
- Site speed matters, too. In a website audit, the speed of WordPress layouts is checked thoroughly and improved where possible.
- Search engine optimization: A website audit also includes checking search engine rankings. The higher a site ranks for keywords, the more search traffic it drives. In this case, removing pages driving no traffic can help.
Most people choose to use SEO plugins or tools for website audits. You can use All in One SEO, Ahrefs, Semrush, or Uber Suggest to help you scan your site for errors, suggestions, and missing opportunities.
Manual vs CMS: Choose one carefully
There is a difference between manual coding and CMS when building a new site, redesigning, or changing a WordPress website.
Here is what you should have considered:
- Manual coding seems outdated and only helps when you need responsiveness on some devices. You can make a manually built site responsive, but it will require more time, cost, and developmental stress.
- WordPress can be used as a backend CMS. In this case, the focus of publishing content is not the target; instead, using WordPress backend to control a website.
- WordPress as a CMS is unique, and its functionality is excellent. There are plugins, 3rd party scripts, integrations, tools, and themes to help you quickly redesign your WordPress. Also, you can use page builders that help you quickly import ready-to-use pages without learning how coding works.
Unless you need a custom infrastructure, using WordPress to redesign your project makes sense.
Test your site in Staging mode
The final but most crucial part is “Testing your site within a staging environment.”
A staging site helps you test your WordPress website redesign before applying changes to a live website.
Here is how you can move forward:
- Build a testing site on WordPress the way you create regular WordPress installation. You will need a web hosting plan, domain name, and SSL settings.
- Once the redesigning process and any new pages or new features are completed, install the whole infrastructure on the staging website and see if you need to include something left behind.
- Once tested and well-satisfied, changes can be applied to the live site.
The whole process of testing WordPress redesigns with a staging environment is to avoid errors, incompatibilities, and mis-happenings.
Final Thoughts on WordPress Website Redesign
That’s how you can redesign a WordPress website without leaving leftovers behind. This resource gives suggestions, advice on what measures to consider, and best practices for improved performance.
Contact our WordPress specialists if you need help with what to do next. We help beginners and advanced users eager to learn more, develop their WordPress projects, or improve and manage their WordPress infrastructures.
Visit our blog for in-depth resources on WordPress redesigning, content audits, and site audit routines.