Website redesign: decide what to keep before changing the design

Start with one customer journey

Choose a typical visitor and walk through the current site on a phone. Can they understand what you offer, whether it fits their situation and what happens next?

For a service business, the route might be: understand the service, see relevant work, compare the scope and ask a question. For a workspace, it might be: get a feel for the place, understand the desk options, check the location and request a tour.

Write down where visitors get stuck. “The mobile menu hides our main service” names a problem you can fix. “Make it more premium” needs more detail: which images, typography, language or interactions would better express the business?

Sort the existing site into keep, improve and replace

Make a simple inventory of the important pages. For each page, record its address, purpose, useful content and intended next step. Include forms, booking links, downloadable files and any integrations that must continue working.

Keep accurate material that helps people decide: a useful service explanation, original project photographs or clear contact details. Improve material that is relevant but difficult to navigate or read. Replace content that describes an old offer, repeats other pages or makes claims you cannot support.

If you have reliable enquiry and traffic records, use them alongside the page review. A page with little traffic may still answer a vital question during a sales conversation. Traffic alone should not decide whether it stays.

Give the visual direction a job

A redesign should make your business recognisable and your offer easier to understand. Agree the message, visual direction and page structure before refining individual effects.

For Vondel Desks, we built the identity and website around a specific offer: your own desk beside Vondelpark. Visitors can explore the space, compare desk options, check the location and arrange a visit. The case study shows the design and structural changes; enquiry growth has not yet been measured over a reliable period.

Motion can support that story, provided the page remains clear on a phone and for visitors who prefer reduced motion. The essential message and next step should work without an animation.

Agree the scope before the build

List the pages and languages, who supplies the copy and photography, and which booking or enquiry tools need connecting. Decide what the initial release includes and what can follow later.

Also clarify how existing page addresses will carry forward, who maintains the website after launch and how changes outside the agreed scope are handled. Compare the setup price and ongoing service together. Our website packages and cost guide explain the current package scope and costs.

Keep search traffic in the redesign plan

Before changing page addresses, export the pages and search queries from Google Search Console. Note which pages receive relevant visits or enquiries. Keep their addresses when the content still serves the same purpose.

For each address that must change, choose the closest replacement and set up a permanent redirect. A retired service page should lead to its replacement, rather than sending every old link to the homepage. Update internal links to point directly to the new pages.

Before launch, check that the pages intended for Google can be crawled and have no noindex setting left over from the preview. Check their canonical URLs and sitemap. After launch, use Search Console to follow indexing and compare search traffic with the period before the redesign. Rankings can fluctuate while Google processes the changes.

Agree who handles these checks when you scope the website redesign. Content migration and additional work should be listed in the proposal.

Test the whole route to an enquiry

Before launch, check both the visible form and what happens after submission. A thank-you message is only one part of the journey. Confirm that the enquiry reaches the intended destination and that the person responsible can find it.

Use clearly labelled tests. Check required fields, error messages, mobile navigation and links from the main service pages. If the site is bilingual, follow the complete journey in each language. Where visitors decline optional analytics, the enquiry form should still work.

After launch, review actual enquiries alongside the website data. Keep internal tests separate from commercial results. Agree which evidence would justify the next improvement before adding more features.

Bring the current site to the conversation

Send us your website and tell us what has changed in your business. What is the one thing the new site needs to do better? That gives us a useful place to start.

Discuss your website redesign