A website redesign can feel like moving houses while still hosting dinner parties. You want everything to look better, work better, and reflect who you are today—without losing the stuff that already works (or accidentally locking your guests out). The tricky part is that redesigns aren’t just “make it prettier.” They can change your traffic, conversions, brand perception, and even how easy it is for your team to update content.
This checklist is built to help you make smart, practical decisions: what to keep because it’s performing, what to fix because it’s costing you, and what to improve because it’ll set you up for the next 2–3 years. It’s long on purpose—redesigns touch a lot of moving parts, and skipping steps is how you end up with a shiny new site that quietly loses leads.
Whether you’re working with an agency or doing a phased refresh in-house, treat this as your planning backbone. You can copy it into a doc, assign owners, and mark items as you go.
Start with the “why”: what success looks like this time
Define outcomes in plain language (not just “modernize”)
“We need a modern site” is a vibe, not a goal. Before anyone opens Figma or picks a theme, write down what you want the redesign to accomplish in real-world terms. Examples: increase demo requests by 25%, reduce support tickets by improving self-serve content, improve local visibility, shorten sales cycles, or recruit better candidates.
Make the outcomes measurable. If you can’t measure it, you can’t tell whether the redesign worked—or whether you just got a prettier version of the same problems. A simple way to do this is to set one primary KPI (like qualified leads) and 2–3 supporting KPIs (like conversion rate, organic traffic, or time to complete a key task).
Also decide what you’re not trying to do. If your goal is lead generation, you might not need a complex interactive experience. If your goal is editorial growth, you might not need a huge product comparison engine. Clarity here prevents scope creep later.
Map redesign goals to real user jobs
Every page should help someone do something: compare options, understand pricing, book a call, find a location, get a spec sheet, or confirm you’re legit. Gather the top 5–10 “jobs” your visitors are trying to complete and make sure the redesign supports them end-to-end.
If you have sales or customer success teams, ask them what questions prospects ask repeatedly. Those questions are content gold—and they often reveal gaps in navigation, messaging, and page structure. Your redesign is a chance to turn repetitive conversations into clear, accessible pages.
Finally, consider mobile-first tasks. A surprising amount of “serious” research happens on phones now. If your forms, menus, and key pages aren’t effortless on mobile, you’ll see it in drop-offs and abandoned sessions.
Inventory what you already have (and decide what deserves to survive)
Content audit: keep, update, merge, or retire
Before you move anything, list every indexable URL on your current site. You can use your CMS export, a crawl tool, or your analytics landing page report. The goal is simple: know what exists, how it performs, and what role it plays.
For each page, label it: Keep (still accurate and performing), Update (valuable but outdated), Merge (thin pages that should become one stronger page), or Retire (no traffic, no value, or wrong direction). This prevents the common redesign mistake of migrating everything “just in case,” which bloats the new site with outdated content and confusing paths.
When you update content, prioritize pages that already rank or convert. Improving an already-performing page often beats publishing five new ones. Preserve the intent, improve clarity, and tighten the call-to-action.
Analytics reality check: what’s actually working
Look beyond vanity metrics. Yes, traffic matters—but you also want to know which pages bring engaged visitors, which sources drive conversions, and which content supports assisted conversions (like blog posts that bring people back later).
Review: top landing pages, top exit pages, highest conversion paths, and pages with high engagement. If a page is a top entry point from Google, treat it like a business asset. Redesigning it without preserving its structure and intent can tank rankings overnight.
Also check device breakdown. If 70% of your traffic is mobile but your conversions are mostly desktop, you likely have a mobile UX problem. That’s a redesign priority, not a “nice to have.”
SEO guardrails: protect rankings while you improve the site
Preserve URL equity with smart redirects and stable architecture
One of the easiest ways to lose organic traffic is to change URLs without a plan. If you must change a URL, set a 301 redirect from the old address to the closest relevant new page. Avoid redirecting everything to the homepage—that frustrates users and sends weak relevance signals to search engines.
Keep your information architecture logical and shallow where possible. Important pages should be reachable within a few clicks from the homepage. If your new navigation hides key pages behind multiple layers, you’re making it harder for both users and search engines.
Make a redirect map before launch. Treat it like a migration checklist item, not an afterthought. After launch, crawl the old URL list and confirm each one properly resolves to the correct destination.
On-page essentials: titles, headings, internal links, and intent
Redesigns often break SEO because teams focus on layout and forget the text structure that helps pages rank. Keep (or improve) unique title tags and meta descriptions. Ensure each page has a clear H1 that matches the page’s intent, and use H2/H3s to organize supporting topics.
Internal linking matters more than people think. When you reorganize navigation, you can accidentally orphan important pages. Build internal links intentionally: from high-authority pages to key service pages, from related blog posts to cornerstone guides, and from FAQs to deeper explanations.
If you operate in a competitive local market, your redesign should support local relevance: clear service areas, location signals, and content that answers local-specific questions. If you’re evaluating strategies or partners in that space, it can help to understand what strong Baton Rouge SEO work looks like—especially around technical cleanup, content alignment, and local intent.
Technical SEO: crawlability, indexation, and performance
Make sure your staging site is blocked from indexing (no accidental “coming soon” pages in Google), and confirm that the live site is crawlable at launch. Check robots.txt, meta robots tags, canonical tags, and XML sitemaps.
Pay attention to Core Web Vitals and overall page speed. Heavy images, unoptimized scripts, and fancy animations can slow things down. Speed isn’t just an SEO factor—it affects conversions. A faster site feels more trustworthy and reduces bounce rates.
After launch, run a crawl to find broken links, missing titles, duplicate metadata, and redirect chains. Fixing these early prevents performance dips and helps search engines re-understand your site faster.
Messaging and positioning: keep what resonates, refine what’s vague
Homepage clarity: who you help, what you do, and why it matters
Your homepage isn’t a brochure—it’s a decision page. Within seconds, visitors should understand what you offer, who it’s for, and what they should do next. If your current homepage already converts well, don’t throw it away. Identify the elements that work: headline, proof points, testimonials, or a strong primary CTA.
During a redesign, teams often replace clear copy with clever copy. Clever is risky. Clarity is profitable. If you want to get creative, do it after the visitor understands the basics.
Also, don’t bury credibility. If you have recognizable clients, certifications, awards, or real results, bring them forward. People want reassurance before they click “Contact.”
Service pages that answer real buying questions
Service pages should do more than describe what you do—they should help someone decide whether you’re the right fit. Include: who it’s for, common problems you solve, your process, what deliverables look like, timelines, and what success typically means.
Use scannable structure: short paragraphs, bullet lists, and clear sections. Most visitors skim first and read second. If your page is a wall of text, you’re making the decision harder than it needs to be.
Finally, make CTAs match intent. On early-stage pages, offer a helpful next step (download, checklist, pricing overview). On high-intent pages, make it easy to book a call or request a quote.
User experience upgrades that pay for themselves
Navigation that matches how people think (not your org chart)
Many websites are organized by internal departments: “Solutions,” “Capabilities,” “Offerings.” Users don’t think like that. They think in goals and problems. Your navigation should reflect the mental model of your customers.
Limit top-level menu items to the essentials. Too many choices creates hesitation. If you have a lot of content, use a well-structured mega menu that’s still easy to scan, or group content into clear categories.
Test your navigation with a quick “can you find…” exercise. Ask someone unfamiliar with your site to locate pricing, a specific service, or a support resource. Their hesitation points are your redesign roadmap.
Forms and CTAs: reduce friction everywhere
Redesigns are the perfect moment to simplify forms. Every field you remove can increase completion rates. Ask only what you truly need to start the conversation. You can always gather more details later.
Make buttons specific. “Submit” is bland and doesn’t set expectations. Try “Get a quote,” “Book a consult,” or “Send my request.” Specific CTAs feel safer because the visitor knows what will happen next.
Also, ensure forms work perfectly on mobile: large tap targets, autofill support, and clear error messages. A redesign that looks great but breaks form usability is a very expensive mistake.
Accessibility basics that improve usability for everyone
Accessibility isn’t just compliance—it’s good UX. Use sufficient color contrast, readable font sizes, and clear focus states for keyboard navigation. Add alt text for meaningful images and ensure form fields have labels.
Headings should follow a logical hierarchy so screen readers can interpret the page structure. Avoid using headings purely for styling. If you need bigger text, use CSS—not an H2 everywhere.
Accessible sites tend to be cleaner, more structured, and easier to maintain. That structure also supports SEO and content clarity, so it’s a win across the board.
Design system and brand consistency: upgrade without starting from scratch
Keep recognizable brand signals while modernizing the look
If your brand is already known, a redesign shouldn’t feel like a totally different company overnight. Keep key signals: logo usage, core color palette (even if refined), tone of voice, and visual motifs that customers associate with you.
Modernizing can mean improving spacing, typography, and layout rhythm more than changing everything. Clean grids, consistent button styles, and better hierarchy can make a site feel premium without a dramatic rebrand.
If you do need a bigger shift, consider a phased approach: update core templates first, then evolve supporting pages over time. That reduces risk and lets you learn from performance data as you go.
Build reusable components to speed up future pages
A redesign isn’t just a set of pages—it’s a system. Create reusable components like testimonial blocks, feature grids, FAQs, pricing tables, and CTA bands. When your team can assemble pages from consistent building blocks, content gets published faster and looks cohesive.
Reusable components also reduce maintenance headaches. Instead of updating 40 pages individually, you update a component once and it updates everywhere it’s used (depending on your CMS setup).
To make this work, document your component rules: when to use each block, recommended word counts, image ratios, and examples of strong copy. That documentation is the difference between a system and a one-time design project.
Tech stack choices: CMS, hosting, and integrations that won’t haunt you later
Choose a CMS based on your team’s reality
The “best” CMS is the one your team can actually use. If marketing needs to publish weekly, a developer-only workflow will slow you down. If you need strict approvals, you’ll want roles, permissions, and staging previews.
Think about content types you’ll need: blog posts, case studies, landing pages, job listings, events, and resource libraries. Your CMS should support these without hacks. Also consider how easy it is to manage redirects, metadata, and structured data.
Plan for growth. If your site will expand into multiple locations, languages, or product lines, your CMS and architecture should handle that without a total rebuild.
Integrations: CRM, analytics, chat, scheduling, and email
List every tool that touches your website: CRM forms, booking calendars, live chat, email marketing, customer support widgets, review platforms, and payment systems. Redesigns often break these connections, so treat integrations as first-class requirements.
Make sure conversion tracking is set up correctly. If you run ads or rely on lead attribution, confirm events are firing and that you can still measure what matters after the redesign. It’s painful to relaunch and realize you can’t tell where leads are coming from anymore.
Also, be careful with too many third-party scripts. They can slow your site and create privacy headaches. Keep what drives value and remove the rest.
Performance and mobile experience: where redesigns win or lose
Speed improvements: images, fonts, scripts, and layout stability
Start with images. Use modern formats (like WebP/AVIF where appropriate), compress aggressively, and serve responsive sizes. A gorgeous hero image that’s 3MB will cost you conversions.
Fonts are another sneaky culprit. Limit the number of font families and weights, and make sure fonts load efficiently. Layout shifts (where content jumps as it loads) can feel sloppy and hurt user trust.
Audit scripts and plugins. Every extra tool adds weight. If you’re using a plugin for a feature you barely use, consider removing it or replacing it with something lighter.
Mobile-first layouts that don’t feel like an afterthought
Design mobile layouts intentionally, not as a collapsed desktop version. Prioritize the main action, simplify navigation, and ensure key content appears early. On mobile, “above the fold” still matters because scrolling is fast but patience is short.
Test with real thumbs. Buttons should be easy to tap, forms should be easy to complete, and menus should be easy to close. If your site requires precision tapping, people will bounce.
Also check mobile readability: line length, font size, spacing, and contrast. A redesign that looks sleek on a big monitor can become frustrating on a phone if you don’t tune these details.
Conversion-focused improvements: turn the redesign into a lead engine
Landing pages built for campaigns and specific offers
If you run promotions, events, seasonal offers, or ad campaigns, you need landing pages that aren’t trapped inside your main navigation. A redesign is a great time to create a flexible landing page template with strong conversion patterns: clear headline, benefits, proof, FAQs, and a single focused CTA.
Keep distractions low. Landing pages should limit off-ramps like full navigation (depending on your strategy). The goal is to help the visitor complete one action, not explore everything.
Make it easy to test. If your template is too rigid, you won’t iterate. If it’s too flexible, pages become inconsistent. Aim for a balanced template with optional sections.
Trust signals: social proof, guarantees, and real evidence
People want reassurance. Add testimonials near key decision points, include case studies with specific outcomes, and show logos of clients or partners (with permission). If you have reviews on third-party platforms, highlight them tastefully.
Guarantees and risk reducers can make a big difference: clear refund policies, transparent timelines, “what happens next” steps, and service-level expectations. Even a simple line like “We reply within one business day” reduces anxiety.
Don’t hide your humans. Team photos, founder stories, and behind-the-scenes process snapshots can increase trust—especially for service businesses.
Content upgrades that improve SEO and help visitors self-educate
Build topic clusters instead of random blog posts
If your blog is a collection of one-off posts, a redesign is your chance to organize it into meaningful hubs. Choose a few core topics you want to be known for and create cornerstone pages that link out to supporting articles.
This structure helps users find related content and helps search engines understand your expertise. It also makes content planning easier because you’re building toward a system rather than publishing whatever comes to mind.
When updating old posts, refresh examples, improve headings, add internal links, and ensure the post matches current intent. Sometimes a small update brings a big traffic lift.
FAQ sections that reduce support load and improve conversions
Great FAQs do two jobs: they answer questions and they remove objections. Add FAQs to service pages, product pages, and pricing pages—wherever people hesitate.
Write answers like a helpful human, not a policy document. Keep them direct, and link to deeper resources when needed. If you can, include small details that show you understand real customer situations.
Also consider adding FAQ schema where appropriate (and where it aligns with search engine guidelines). It can improve how your pages appear in results and increase click-through rate.
Design and build execution: how to avoid the common redesign traps
Template planning: design fewer pages, build smarter
Most sites don’t need 40 unique page designs. They need a handful of strong templates: homepage, service page, about page, contact page, blog index, blog post, case study, and landing page. From there, reusable components handle the variety.
When you plan templates, think about content flexibility. For example, a service page template should allow different proof points, different FAQs, and different CTAs depending on the service. That keeps pages from feeling copy-pasted.
If you’re working with a partner for website design and development, ask early how templates and components will be documented and handed off. A redesign is much more valuable when your team can confidently build new pages after launch.
Staging reviews: check content, UX, and tracking before launch day
Don’t wait until launch week to review everything. Schedule structured reviews: one for messaging and content, one for UX and mobile behavior, one for SEO and technical items, and one for tracking and integrations.
Use a checklist during reviews. It’s easy to get distracted by aesthetics and miss functional issues like broken forms, missing metadata, or confusing navigation labels.
Also test with different browsers and devices. A design that works perfectly in Chrome on a Mac can behave differently on Safari or older Android devices.
Migration and launch plan: the part that protects your traffic
Redirects, sitemaps, and post-launch crawling
Finalize your redirect map before launch. Include old URLs from your content audit, top landing pages from analytics, and any URLs with backlinks (you can find these in SEO tools). The goal is to preserve equity and prevent 404s.
Update your XML sitemap and submit it to search engines after launch. Make sure the sitemap includes only canonical, indexable URLs—no staging pages, no parameter junk.
Within 24–72 hours after launch, run a full crawl and fix issues quickly: broken internal links, missing titles, redirect chains, and unexpected noindex tags. The faster you clean up, the smoother the transition.
Analytics and conversion tracking verification
Confirm your analytics setup before and after launch. Check that pageviews are recording, events are firing, and conversions are attributed properly. If you use a tag manager, verify triggers and variables still match the new DOM structure.
Test every form and lead flow end-to-end: submit a test lead, confirm it hits your CRM, confirm notifications arrive, and confirm any automations (like email sequences) still work. Redesigns often break these silently.
If you rely on call tracking, test phone number swaps and ensure click-to-call works on mobile. Small tracking issues can lead to big reporting confusion later.
Paid media and remarketing: align the redesign with your acquisition channels
Ad-to-landing-page alignment and message match
If you’re running paid search or social ads, your redesign should support message match: the promise in the ad should be clearly reflected on the landing page. When visitors feel like they landed in the right place, conversion rates rise.
Make sure your landing pages load fast, are easy to understand, and have a single primary CTA. If you’re sending ad traffic to a generic service page with multiple CTAs and lots of navigation options, you’re paying for distraction.
Also, keep an eye on quality signals. Better landing page experience can reduce costs and improve performance in many ad platforms.
Remarketing foundations and targeted placements
Redesigns can disrupt remarketing if pixels and audiences aren’t carried over correctly. Verify your remarketing tags and consent settings, and confirm audience building continues after launch.
If you want to expand beyond basic retargeting, consider placements that reach people while they browse relevant content. Many teams pair a redesigned site with display advertising solutions to stay visible during longer decision cycles—especially when customers compare options over days or weeks.
Finally, make sure your redesigned pages support remarketing goals: clear next steps, strong proof, and content that answers objections. Remarketing traffic is warm, but it still needs a reason to act.
Quality assurance checklist: what to test before you tell the world
Functional testing: links, forms, search, and error handling
Click every major navigation path and verify it works. Check footer links, social links, and any downloads. Broken links are common after migrations, especially when content is moved or renamed.
Test all forms with real inputs and edge cases. Make sure error messages are helpful, confirmation states are clear, and submissions don’t get lost. If you have site search, test common queries and confirm results are relevant.
Also check 404 handling. A good 404 page helps users recover with helpful links or a search bar. A bad 404 page is a dead end.
Content QA: consistency, tone, and visual polish
Review for consistency: capitalization, button labels, spacing, image styles, and icon usage. These details are what make a site feel “finished.” Inconsistent UI elements make visitors subconsciously question reliability.
Proofread key pages carefully—especially headlines, CTAs, and pricing-related content. A redesign is often when old copy gets pasted into new layouts, and small errors slip through.
Check images for cropping on different screen sizes. What looks great on desktop can cut off faces or important product details on mobile.
After launch: how to keep improving without another full redesign
Set a 30/60/90-day optimization plan
Launch day isn’t the finish line—it’s the start of better data. Plan improvements in phases. In the first 30 days, focus on fixing bugs, addressing SEO issues, and stabilizing performance. In 60 days, start optimizing conversion paths based on behavior data. In 90 days, test bigger changes like new landing pages, new offers, or expanded content hubs.
Use heatmaps or session recordings if you can. They reveal where people hesitate, what they ignore, and where they rage-click. Pair that with analytics to prioritize fixes that impact real outcomes.
Also keep a backlog. Every stakeholder will have ideas after launch—capture them, score them by impact and effort, and work through them systematically.
Governance: keep the site clean as it grows
Websites get messy when there’s no ownership. Assign someone to maintain standards: page templates, component usage, URL rules, and content quality. This doesn’t have to be heavy-handed—just consistent.
Create simple publishing guidelines: how to write headlines, how to format sections, how to add internal links, and how to optimize images. This keeps your site fast and cohesive over time.
Finally, schedule a quarterly mini-audit: check top pages, broken links, site speed, and conversion rates. Small ongoing maintenance is far cheaper than another emergency redesign two years from now.
A practical redesign checklist you can copy into your project plan
What to keep (protect these assets)
High-performing pages: Preserve top landing pages, top conversion pages, and pages with strong backlinks. Keep their intent and core structure, even if you refresh the design and copy.
Proven messaging: If certain headlines, offers, or proof points consistently drive leads, keep them. You can refine tone and clarity, but don’t remove what’s already working.
Brand recognition elements: Maintain recognizable brand cues so returning visitors feel oriented. A redesign should feel like an upgrade, not a different company.
What to fix (these issues quietly cost you leads)
Slow pages and heavy assets: Compress images, reduce scripts, and improve Core Web Vitals. Speed improvements often deliver immediate conversion gains.
Confusing navigation: Rebuild the menu around user goals. Remove clutter and make key pages easy to find on mobile.
Broken tracking and unclear CTAs: Ensure analytics, events, and form tracking work. Replace vague CTAs with specific next steps that match page intent.
What to improve (these upgrades set you up for growth)
Reusable templates and components: Build a system your team can use to publish quickly without sacrificing quality.
Content structure and internal linking: Organize content into hubs, strengthen internal links, and update older pages to match current search intent.
Landing pages for campaigns: Create focused templates for ads, promotions, and remarketing so acquisition efforts convert better.