Building A Better Website, Part 2 – The Redesign 

It’s no secret — a great website is arguably the most effective and cost-efficient marketing channel out there.  But because the web is a constantly evolving space, it’s important to stay current, both technically and aesthetically. As discussed in Part 1, after two years — a lifetime in the digital era — we knew ECHOtape’s site needed a redesign. Our first step? Utilizing powerful analytical tools like Google Analytics, we evaluated ECHOtape’s traffic, referrals, conversions, bounce rates, etc., and from that, developed a clearer picture of our current online audience.

The most important thing we learned? More than 75% of our traffic is from new visitors! That was a major revelation. The last iteration of the website was predicated on the idea that our visitors already knew who we were.  Two years later, turns out that the majority of people landing on echotape.com may know little to nothing about our company (I guess our marketing outreach is working!).  Clearly, the redesign needed to make sure these new visitors could easily learn more about who we are and why they should do business with us.

With that key data in hand, it was time to create the design plan.

Aesthetically, we recognized that that our old website was a bit too stuffy and corporate; and with so much going on, it wasn’t obvious what the visitor should do first when they got to our home page. The existing design also does not convey the current version of out brand personality and voice – something we have continually adapted and modified on a regular basis.

So we decided to rebrand with:

  • Colors that are in line with our brand and to use specific other colors sparingly to help visitors know what to do when they arrive
  • A layout that is easy to navigate and inspires people to learn more about the company and our products;
  • A more modern voice that speaks about exploring questions and discovering answers;
  • Typography that is modern and friendly;
  • Testimonials from a wide range of customers that can showcase our reliability, expertise and creativity;
  • Pages that are responsive and mobile friendly; and, last but not least
  • Call-to-actions that increase conversation and conversion.

With a clear picture of what we wanted to achieve with the new site, we reached out to our favorite web designer to develop the theme. To make life easier and the process more affordable, we chose to customize an already existing WordPress template. We have used templates in the past and it’s proven to be very helpful in streamlining the process.  Our designer uses the templates and then makes it our own by adding in a lot of custom design elements.  It didn’t take long for us to land on a visual package that best represented our unique qualities and brand message. Now that the design is done, we are starting the coding process.  So stay tuned as we plan to launch in the next few weeks!

Of course, like most creative endeavors, we had way more ideas than we could use. But one that stood out, and that we are excited to add to the mix, is creating our first company video. That’s right. VIDEO!! That story is next.

Are you redesigning your company website? Outside of our internal analysis, we found this American Express OPEN article to be very helpful in keeping our strategy focused. 

 

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