Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Thinking about a website redesign? These are the things you should consider.

If you’re pondering a website redesign, you’re not alone. Major companies tend to redesign their websites every two to  three years. Some websites even undergo work or changes every six months. 

But perhaps you’re a smaller business, or just one person. In these cases, how do you know if or when your website needs a redesign? 

The decision will be clear and easy if you use the below information to evaluate. Here are all the ways to tell if your website needs a redesign.

1. Your website is dated

Dated can mean many different things when it comes to websites.

The first thing that may come to mind is that the website is old and clunky. Year after year, websites become more modern and streamlined. Sometimes less is more when it comes to a website, and a refresh will add new web design trends and give it an updated, more contemporary look. 

To say it bluntly, if your website is ugly, it’s time for a new one!

If your website has a lot of cheesy stock photos, graphics or styling, this may mean it’s time for a change. Updating photos can give the website a whole new look, just make sure that your image size is alway optimised so as to not slow your site down. 

2020 is all about sustainability. It’s cool to be eco-friendly, and your website should be too. Creating and maintaining a sustainable website will ensure your brand stays relevant in current times. Plus, saving the planet one website at a time means you’re doing your part.

Your brand should inspire trust in your clients and customers, and having a fresh website is one of the best ways to do so. Customers trust in brands that take the time and energy to maintain a user-friendly website, which leads me to my next point.

2. Visitors can’t find what they’re looking for

If your visitors can’t find what they’re looking for, the result is simple — they’ll go elsewhere. It doesn’t matter how great your product is. If customers can’t access it (and access it quickly), they’ll get frustrated and move on, likely to a competitor.

Maybe the information they need or want is there, but if they can’t find it, or processes are erroring out, they won’t stay — or come back. 

And of course, if anything about your brand has changed — your contact details, your offerings or services, your logo or really anything at all, it’s important that your website evolves to reflect whatever is new.

3. Your website isn’t getting sales, traffic or leads

Your website should be getting you business. Clicks lead to customers, and if those clicks aren’t leading to anything, then it’s time for a redo. 

Using the right keywords should help drive traffic to your site. If your traffic isn’t high, you may need to consider changing those keywords so your site ranks in searches and is apt for your target audience. SEO is important for search rankings, essentially gaining you more views which can hopefully then turn into sales or business.

Another thing to consider is bounce rate. Are people leaving your site before they even get a chance to really check it out? If your bounce rate is high, it means your customers are not finding what they need, at least not on the first try. When someone leaves before their drink order arrives on a blind date, you know it’s time for a makeover, and the same goes for websites.

And some visitors may take a little longer to check things out, but if you’re finding that they leave shortly thereafter, it means your site simply isn’t concise or user-friendly. The longer visitors spend perusing your site, the more likely it is that they’ll become a customer — or at least remember you. 

This is when conversion rate comes in. It should be easy for visitors to become customers — but does your site make that simple enough? Have you ever searched around a website, frustrated and eventually left because you couldn’t figure out how to make an appointment, get the information you needed or successfully complete a purchase? If you seem to have a lot of visitors but not enough customers, it could be a sign that your website just isn’t well-designed. 

And once a consumer is lost or frustrated with your website, it’s hard to regain that trust and change them into a client.

4. Your website is slow or has technical issues

We live in a world where users have zero patience for slow websites, broken websites or having to constantly refresh websites. In fact, 41% of people say that technology has made them more impatient than they were five years ago. Thanks to instant gratification people get from speedy new websites, they’ll have less patience for your site if it’s slow.

In fact, a study by BBC showed that for every additional second it takes a page to load, 10% of users leave. That essentially means that if your website takes an extra five seconds to load, you’re losing 50% of your traffic! 

Maybe your images are taking forever to load, or your links are broken. A website redesign can help optimise your links and image file sizes and move your site to a more reliable web host*, speeding everything up.

And don’t forget that mobile phones account for over 50% of website traffic. If your website looks substandard or won’t load correctly/ quickly enough on a phone, it’s time to change that. Plus, new web design trends will ensure that your website can look better than ever on a phone, and that’s an easy way to gain customers that are constantly on the go.

5. It’s annoying to manage and update your site

We’ve focused on the visitor experience thus far, but what about your own experience using and updating your website? 

After all, you are responsible for adding new information, services and updates to your website. If the admin area is confusing or slow to respond, it will take more time to update it. 

Or worse, you’ll have to pay someone to update it regularly. Paying someone for a redesign so you can easily update and manage your own site is much more cost-effective in the long run.

You don’t want to be dealing with learning code to edit your website when there are CMS options out there that make it simple for business owners to update and manage their websites. Systems like WordPress have a plugin for just about everything, and once your website is updated, you can use it to do new and different things to help your business grow.

6. You don’t have a website to begin with

I hate to state the obvious, but it’s 2020. And if you don’t have a website, you should. What are you waiting for? 

Having social media accounts is not enough. A Facebook page does not replace the professional look of your own website. 

Setting up that website with all the latest web design trends will help customers take your brand/business seriously. And, it will connect you to more users. This gives more people the opportunity to find out about what you and your business are offering to the world.

How to start your website redesign

The hardest part is admitting that you need a website redesign — or a website in the first place. So now what? 

Stay tuned for my next article on planning a website redesign, which will include a handy checklist with all the things you need to know and do when starting and managing a website redesign.

If a website redesign (or getting your first website) seems overwhelming, I can help. Click here to see some of my website redesigns, and contact me here to discuss packages, options and rates.

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* An affiliate link to a company I personally use and recommend. I’ll receive a small commission if you sign up with them but it won’t effect the price you pay.

Photo by Markus Spiske via Unsplash

Optimise your website by reducing image size (without losing quality) to help it run faster and improve performance.

Nothing’s more irritating than waiting for a website to load. Slow and clunky websites should be a thing of the past, but many sites don’t run as quickly as they could. And image size may be the culprit.

A study by BBC showed that for every additional second it takes a page to load, 10% of users leave. That essentially means that if your website takes an extra five seconds to load, you’re losing 50% of your traffic! Research by Google also showed that if your website takes three seconds or more to load, 53% of users will leave.

Reducing image size can help your site load and respond quicker so you don’t lose out on those page views or potential clients. And optimising images can also help boost your website’s SEO rank too. In 2018, Google made website speed a factor in mobile search ranking.

But what does image optimisation have to do with speed?

Maintaining a speedy website involves a number of factors, but making sure your images are small is something that can really help to keep things moving quickly. It makes sense: smaller images load faster, and a faster website ensures an improved user experience and therefore a higher retention rate. 

How to optimise your images

Thanks to online image optimisation tools, it’s easy (and free!) to make sure your images aren’t slowing down your site. 

Many online tools exist to shrink images, but some are better than others. The best online tools will shrink your images while still retaining their quality, ensuring your website runs as smoothly and as quickly as possible. These are a few of my personal favourites:

• Tiny JPEG
• Kraken
• Reduce Images 

Tiny JPEG

Tiny JPEG uses an encoder to analyze each image’s texture, pattern and colour. Apt for users wanting to resize several photos in one go, you can drop or upload up to 20 JPEG files. The tool then strips the image of unnecessary metadata. This ensures your photo files are now smaller without sacrificing image quality. 

My favourite feature of Tiny JPEG is the WordPress plugin which automatically optimises new images upon upload. And if that’s not enough, the brand’s adorable animated panda bear happily chomps on bamboo and cheers once your images are successfully reduced in size.

Kraken

Although there’s a paid pro version of Kraken, the free version is surprisingly versatile. You can upload images directly or simply type in a URL. Users can choose from three types of optimization modes: lossy, which is the most common, lossless, which retains every single detail if you’re working with extremely detailed images and expert (best for photographers or pros), which allows for a more custom image adjustment. 

Reduce Images

Reduce Images is ideal for beginners or those needing more custom image resizing for just a few images. Upload a photo and then choose a new size (by percent or pixels), format (JPEG, PNG or GIF) and background color (black or white).

Bottom line

Using these easy tools, there’s no excuse for having large images that clog up your site. But if you simply can’t be bothered or are wondering what else may be slowing your website down, get in touch. I can provide an analysis of your website to figure out what’s causing the issue and how to fix it. 

Photo by Roscoe Myrick

“No win, no trees” is the new motto of Arsenal’s Hector Bellerin, a footballer who has started his own unique sustainability campaign. He’s promised to plant 3,000 trees each time Arsenal wins a game this season.

The Premier League is back to business after a 100-day shutdown thanks to coronavirus, and Bellerin isn’t wasting any time. At the time of writing, Arsenal has won four games thus far, which means Bellerin has planted 12,000 trees. 

For every @Arsenal game we win this season I will plant 3,000 trees to help combat the carbon emissions issues we have. Follow the link to learn more on how you can get involved by planting a tree with me @onetreeplanted 🌳https://t.co/mQSqqGc7R5 pic.twitter.com/d0J9OGa1jO

— Héctor Bellerín (@HectorBellerin) June 17, 2020

Plus, after a 7th July match that ended in a draw with Leicester City, he planted 3,000 more for good measure — Arsenal put in a worthy effort, after all.

Personally feel we didn’t deserve that result last night. Tough to take after the fight and courage from the whole team, therefore I will still plant those trees! pic.twitter.com/FJqqADEXuL

— Héctor Bellerín (@HectorBellerin) July 8, 2020

Bellerin’s trees are planted in the Amazon, an area of the world which is feeling the effects of deforestation at an alarming rate. In just a one-year period in 2018/2019, the Amazon lost almost four thousand square miles of rainforest. Let’s hope Arsenal keeps winning — because the Amazon could really use the extra help.

You can join Bellerin in saving the Amazon by donating: for every dollar donated, one tree will be planted. On his fundraiser page, he shows his support for a sustainable future, saying, “I care deeply about making a positive impact for future generations. We need healthy places to play outdoors and where biodiversity can thrive in nature. Thanks to support from the team and fans, we can plant lots of trees together!” At the time of posting, almost $20,000 of his $30,000 goal has been raised.

That’s not the only way you can help. Bellerin is working with an organisation called One Tree Planted, and you can donate apart from his campaign to offset your carbon — one easy way to make your own website (or lifestyle) more sustainable.

While you can always just randomly plant trees at your leisure in various locations around the world with One Tree Planted, consider using Tree Nation, which offers CO2 neutral packages that fits your needs. Packages guarantee to offset a fixed amount of carbon by planting a specific number of trees each month. 

And if Arsenal has a losing streak, don’t fret. True environmentalists may even hope they lose, because the Amazon will still get its trees — double the amount, in fact. In response to Bellerin’s campaign, Paddy Power has announced they’ll plant 6,000 trees every time Arsenal loses. Now that is truly a win-win.

Everything seems to have a carbon footprint these days — even your website. The internet accounts for almost as much carbon emission as the aviation industry does — maybe even more in years to come. But you can actively ensure your website is part of the solution, not the problem by reducing your site’s carbon footprint — in addition to ensuring it’s eco-friendly to begin with.

What is a carbon footprint?

A carbon footprint is the amount of greenhouse gas emissions (typically carbon dioxide and methane) released into the air as a result of activity done by a particular person, company, organization, industry etc. 

It is possible to calculate your own personal carbon footprint, though this can get complicated. Some of the things to evaluate include your travel, diet, energy use and shopping habits. It turns out a single average human is responsible for 4-20 tonnes of emissions each year. 

But what about websites? 

An average website produces about 1.76 grams of CO2 per page view. If your website is getting 5,000 views per month, that means it’s emitting about 105 kg of CO2 per year. 15,000 views per month would send out almost 317 kg of CO2 per year, around the same as a flight from London to Istanbul. Just think about all the websites in the world — the amount of CO2 emitted from the internet is dizzying. 

If you’re panicking a bit, don’t. The first step is to see how much CO2 your website is actually producing. Then, you can work on making your website more eco-friendly and offsetting your carbon emissions.

Start by typing your website’s URL into the Website Carbon Calculator from Wholegrain Digital. The calculator takes things like data transfers, the energy intensity of web data, website traffic and if your data centre powers your website with a green energy source into consideration when calculating your site’s emissions. 

The results are clearly stated, explaining your website’s CO2 emissions. Your site will be compared to others, letting you know if yours is cleaner (or not) than most other websites.

Here are the results from of one of my recent blog posts:

Viewing these simple comparisons will give you a clearer view of where your website stands. For example, the last website I checked explained that it had used 212kWh of energy, enough electricity to drive an electric car 1,357km over the course of a year with 10,000 views per month.

The carbon calculator also explains how you can best take action — but more on that later.

The carbon footprint of the world’s most used websites

You might be surprised to find out the carbon footprint of some of the world’s most popular websites — it may not be what you think.

To spice things up a bit, let’s play a game. I tested the carbon footprints of these four websites:

Which websites do you think have the biggest and smallest carbon footprints? No cheating! Take a guess at each of the stats below and then click the coloured boxes to reveal the answers.

Don’t worry if you didn’t get them right — the most important thing to know is how clean your own website is. Then you can figure out how to use carbon offsetting in your (and the planet’s) favour.

How to reduce your website’s carbon footprint

It’s easy to help reduce your website’s carbon footprint. There are many ways you can do this:

1. Optimise your website. Websites that are slow and lagging often need to be optimised to work faster and more sustainably. I can help you optimise your site and make sure it’s running as sustainably as possible.
2. Switch to an eco-friendly web host. As you’ve noticed by the above quiz, some major websites use sustainable web hosting and some don’t. Why not make the switch to a more sustainable host such as Eco Web Hosting or Green Geeks*? I can also help you make your site’s transition to an eco-friendly web host smooth and simple.
3. Consider offsetting your carbon use. Some of the best ways to do this will be detailed out below. 

What is carbon offsetting?

Carbon offsetting goes beyond just making your website sustainable. It’s kind of like a trade: you do something to make up for the emissions your website has put out. You can invest in an eco-positive project that in turn reduces greenhouse gas emissions. Essentially, it evens out the playing field.

There are many benefits of carbon offsetting your website:

• Your website’s carbon footprint is balanced
• You’re setting a solid example for other websites
• If others follow your lead, real change can happen
• You’ll attract readers/clients/customers that find sustainability important

How to offset your website’s carbon use

Even with eco-friendly web hosting and sustainable website optimisation, your website will still leave a carbon footprint. The good news is you can reduce this carbon footprint by offsetting it in a variety of ways.

The most popular way to do this is by planting trees using a website like Tree Nation or One Tree Planted. You could also consider supporting carbon offset projects that help bring renewable energy options or clean water to developing countries or groups of people that need it. Some of these are things like Panama Wind Energy, ceramic water cooler production in Cambodia or efficient household cookstoves in Kenya.

Gold Standard Certified Emission Reductions price their offset options by tonne. These projects range from things like funding solar energy in India or chlorine water dispensers in Uganda. 

Bottom line

The internet leaves a major carbon footprint that contributes to climate change. Make sure to handle your website’s carbon footprint with eco-friendly web optimisation and with carbon offsets like planting trees or supporting renewable energy projects. Don’t be Amazon.com, instead, plant trees in the Amazon.

I’m happy to help you optimise your website and to make it more sustainable. For more information or a quote, feel free to contact me here. 

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* An affiliate link to a company I personally use and recommend. I’ll receive a small commission if you sign up with them but it won’t effect the price you pay.

Running a sustainable business takes a certain level of organisation and commitment. Sometimes, the easiest or most affordable route isn’t the most eco-friendly. Nevertheless, if you’re dedicated enough, you can easily make your business or brand more sustainable — and that includes your website.

You may (or may not) be surprised to learn the internet contributes to global carbon emissions because of the vast amounts of energy consumed in powering the infrastructure and devices we use to access our favourite websites. In fact, a study by the Boston Consulting Group claimed the internet contributes to at least two percent of the world’s carbon emissions. This means the internet is responsible for putting out over one billion tonnes of greenhouse gases each year into the environment. This number is predicted to double by 2025, according to BBC. Ensuring you have a green website means you’re doing your part to help reduce your carbon footprint.

Setting up eco-friendly websites or changing to eco-friendly web hosting isn’t difficult if you know the basics (and of course, I’ve got you covered if you need any assistance!). You won’t have to forgo any advanced design features or useful widgets if you do it right, either. Here are five simple steps to ensure your website matches the sustainability of your brand.

1. Test your website 

First, you’ll need to figure out how green your website already is. Start intuitively — if your website is moving slowly or taking forever to load, it may not be just a slow Wi-Fi connection, it may be a sign your website isn’t operating in a sustainable manner and is overusing energy.

But it’s best to understand exactly how green your website is with detailed information on what you’re doing right (and wrong). Once you know, you can begin to make the necessary changes to create a more eco-friendly website. This can be done using EcoGrader. 

EcoGrader will score your website on scale of 0 to 100 using filters like page speed, findability, design speed, user experience and green hosting. Depending on your results, you’ll know how dire the situation is. Don’t worry if you get a terrible score, because the below solutions can easily help you improve it.

2. Switch to a green web host

One of the simplest ways to make your website more sustainable is to switch to eco web hosting. An eco web host uses servers powered by renewable energy and offsets any carbon use.

Eco Web Hosting is an example of a web host that is dedicated to running a green business. Besides offsetting their energy use by planting trees and using sustainable energy sources, this particular company ensures its hiring and employee practices are responsible too.

You can either start from scratch or switch from your current web host to Eco Web Hosting — they make migration easy and painless. And, each package comes complete with between 4-10 trees planted per month.

Another alternative for eco web hosting is Green Geeks*. The hosting platform gives back by not just offsetting the carbon emissions put out — they offset three times the amount!

3. Optimise your site

Once you’ve got a green web host, it’s time to make sure the design elements of your website are just as eco-friendly. As you can likely see from the EcoGrader test, there may be things on your website that are slowing it down, like flash players, photos, videos, widgets and more. 

Take a good, hard look and evaluate your site. Is there too much to look at? Is it taking forever to load? A study by Google confirmed that users prefer simple websites better than overly complex ones. Think about what you can get rid of and focus on the most important images, text and layouts that best align with your brand. 

Plenty of services can help you when optimising your site. You can easily reduce image sizes (often by up to 80%) by compressing them using Kraken and re-uploading them to your website. Or, if your site runs on WordPress, try the TinyPNG Plugin to optimise your existing images directly from your WP dashboard. Make it a habit to routinely utilise a tool like Dr. Link Checker which will help you find and fix any broken links. 

4. Offset your site’s carbon use by planting trees

No matter how eco-friendly your website is, it’s still going to need to use some energy. Offset it by planting trees. 

While you can always just randomly plant trees using a website like One Tree Planted, consider using Tree Nation, which offers CO2 neutral packages that fits your needs. Packages start at just 5€ per month and guarantee to offset a fixed amount of carbon by planting a specific number of trees each month. 

Tree Nation also allows you to create a widget for your webpage which specifically notes your website’s CO2 impact and calculates the exact number of trees you’d need to plant to offset it.

5. Use a renewable energy provider

Using a renewable energy provider will ensure your business is even more green. Every time you turn on your computer, pop over to your website or charge your smartphone, you can rest easy knowing you’re powering your tech using wind, solar, hydro or other renewable energy sources.

For those based in the U.K or Spain, (Bulb.co.uk or Bulb.es*) is one of the best renewable energy suppliers, charging a single tariff for electricity and gas — and no exit fees. If you’re based in the U.S., have a look at Green Mountain Energy, which has special plans for small businesses.

Bottom line

Making your website more eco-friendly is an easy way to keep sustainability strong within all sectors of your green business. But if it seems just a little too complicated to set up or migrate your sustainable brand to a more sustainable website, I’d love to help.

For more information or a quote, feel free to contact me here.

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* An affiliate link to a company I personally use and recommend. I’ll receive a small commission if you sign up with them but it won’t effect the price you pay.