Risks of a Website Redesign Without SEO Considerations and Planning

A website redesign is when a company or individual makes changes to their existing website. This can be anything from updating the design and layout, to changing the content or functional programming of the site. This process is often done to improve the user experience (UX), better reflect the company’s brand, or keep up with the latest web design trends.

However, redesigns can also be risky! If not done correctly, a redesign can cause your new website to plummet down the search engine rankings. This is why it is important to consider search engine optimization (SEO) when planning a redesign. By doing this, you can avoid many of the common pitfalls and ensure that your new site is successful.

Why would you want to redesign your website?

There are many reasons why you might want to redesign their website. When to redesign will depend on several factors, including the age of your current site, how well it’s performing, and whether you’re making major changes to the design or functionality. 

Maybe you feel like your current site is outdated, or maybe you want to add new features and functionality. Sometimes, a company will redesign its website as part of a rebranding effort, or in response to changes in its industry. Other times, a website might be redesigned to improve the user experience (UX) in consideration of valuable customer feedback. No matter what the reason, if you’re considering a website redesign, it’s important to make sure that you don’t forget about SEO.

What are the risks of redesigning a website without considering SEO?

There are a few risks associated with redesigning a website without considering SEO. If not taken into account, these risks will likely result in your new website performing worse than your old one!

1. Lose traffic and rankings.

If you make changes to your site without considering how those changes will affect your SEO, you could end up losing traffic and rankings in search engines. This is because search engines use things like your site’s title, URL structure, and content to determine where your site should rank on their results pages. 

Keep in mind that your website has already built SEO equity during its years of existence. This equity is the value that your website has in terms of its ranking and traffic from search engines. It is based on things like the age of your domain, the number of high-quality backlinks you have, and your overall popularity in search. If you lose your SEO equity, it will be much harder to regain lost ground. As a result, your rankings could (and likely will) suffer. 

2. Miss out on opportunities to improve your SEO.

A website redesign is a perfect opportunity to improve your SEO. But if you don’t take the time to consider how your changes will impact your SEO, you could miss out on this opportunity. For example, if you’re changing your URL structure, this is a perfect time to make sure that all of your old URLs are redirected to the new ones. This will help preserve any existing rankings and traffic that you have, and it will also help ensure that users can still find your site even if they have an old bookmark or link. 

3. Website becomes difficult to crawl and index.

When making even the slightest change to your website, you must consider how search engines crawl and index websites. Crawling is when search engines send out robots – called spiders – to visit websites and collect information about them. This collected information is then used to create listings for the search engine’s results pages. While indexing is when these listings are created and stored in the search engine’s database. 

So if your website is difficult to crawl and index, it will be much harder for users to find it via search. This could lead to decreased traffic and rankings, as well as a decrease in the number of pages that are indexed by search engines. 

4. Users will have difficulty navigating your site.

One of the top reasons why companies do a website redesign is to address user feedback and provide a better UX. If you don’t consider these things, users will have a difficult time navigating your new site. This could lead to decreased traffic and conversions, as well as an increase in the number of people who leave your site without taking any action. 

How can you avoid these risks?

Website redesign comes with a lot of risks, but the good news is these risks are highly avoidable. Here are a few things that you can do to avoid these risks.

1. Educate yourself on SEO.

If you’re considering a website redesign, it’s important to educate yourself on SEO. This way, you’ll be able to make changes to your site that will actually improve your SEO, instead of unintentionally harming it. 

2. Work with an SEO expert.

If you’re not confident in your ability to navigate the world of SEO, you can always work with an SEO expert. They’ll be able to help you make changes to your site that will improve your SEO and avoid any potential pitfalls. 

3. Make sure that your redesign is necessary.

Before you make any changes to your website, it’s important to ask yourself if a redesign is necessary. If your site is already ranking well and getting traffic, you might not need to make any changes. On the other hand, if your site is struggling in search engines, a redesign could be just what you need to help turn things around. 

4. Plan your redesign carefully.

If you do decide that a website redesign is necessary, it’s important to plan it carefully. This way, you can make sure that all of the changes you make will improve your SEO.