Is it time to freshen up your website design?

Is it time to freshen up your website design?

Is your charity coming into a new season? Are you looking to change how you reach people online? It may be time to think about freshening up your website with a new design and with our variety of design options for different budgets you won't be stuck for choice. If you are unsure, take a look at our list below to decide whether it may be time for you to invest in a new design for your charity website.

1. Your website doesn’t accurately reflect your charity anymore
   
   Having a badly designed website can be far more detrimental than having no website at all in this day-and-age, where we are constantly surrounded by strong branding. A website serves as the first contact that many will have with you, so making a strong first impression is important. Your website needs to accurately reflect your ethos and mission statement so that website visitors gain the correct perception of you.

2. Your charity website design is outdated in relation to current trends
   
   Whilst trends in design change often, there does come a point when your website may need a complete overhaul to ensure it does not look dated and over the past couple of years in particular, trends have changed in quite a substantial way. It used to be the trend to utilise multimedia on a website, however websites that use a high degree of various media on their website need to reassess this in light of the usage of mobile devices. Two dimensional, flat designs are becoming the norm now for professional websites because these adapt better to mobile devices. Many design trends do come and go as we all know but this is considerable change that if not followed could severely effect your website, for the reasons noted in our next point.

3. Your charity website is not catering for mobile users
   
   Your website could be turning away a large proportion of potential visitors if it does not follow current design trends as mentioned in the above point. Not only does a fresh, modern design look more appealing but it will also help you ensure that you are not penalised by Google. Internet access via mobile devices has surpassed the usage via desktops and so if your website does not accurately cater for this then Google will not list your website in its mobile search rankings. All our websites cater to mobile-friendly designs to ensure that your website is not penalised, however there are further design elements that our designers can implement to make it look even better on a mobile device.

4. Your charity website is difficult to navigate and needs new functionalities
   
   If a visitor to your website has to spend more than 30 seconds to find what they are looking for on your website, they are very likely to leave and not return. A badly designed website can be as irritating as nails down a chalk board. Creating an easy to navigate website should be a top priority, as the website is ultimately there to serve the visitor and if they have bad service it is unlikely that they will return. Our designers can help ensure that you website is easy to navigate, across all devices. An easy to navigate website should also make it a logical process for a visitor to follow on the path that you wish for them to take on your website, such as, guiding them towards an online donation button, or a contact form. Any major area or feature that you want people to use should be seamless tied into the design so that the website actually leads users to where you want them to go.  

If you identified with these then it may be time for a new design, please contact us regarding our design packages. Our team are on hand to answer any queries that you may have and will help guide you into the next steps for your website.

You can call us on 0121 651 1140 or email hello@charityedit.co.uk