Three tips to improving your website (without starting over)

It used to be that a website was a static repository of anything and everything a company wanted to say about itself and its products or services. There was a set it and forget it mentality, with most updates being simply copy additions. After a while it would become clear that a change was needed, leading to a complete overhaul.

But modern websites operate more like a living, breathing part of your sales and marketing ecosystem, which means they need to be given regular love and attention to ensure optimal performance and relevancy. The upside to this continuous nurturing is that you can make significant changes and improvements to your website – without starting over.

Tip #1: Continuous improvements vs. website redesigns

Design with the future in mind

When you create a website with a future-proof design system and architecture, it will expand and grow with your business without falling apart every few years. By designing with the future in mind using a systematic approach, you are set up to win in the long term. In our experience, sites built with modular component systems can absorb new features and content types for 5-7 years before needing structural changes.

Build a support team

Once your site launches, you want to keep your design, development, and marketing teams in close contact. Your business is ever-changing. The way customers use your site evolves, as does how you stay relevant in a digital space. To get the most value out of your website and remain relevant, you need to continually nurture your site after it goes live. You can use your existing team(s), or look to a business like Good Work that specializes in post-launch aftercare and long-term partnerships.

Examples of continuous improvements

There are countless small updates that can be made through continuous improvements to your site. Some of the most common that we see (and recommend) include:

• Plugin updates
• Copy updates
• Landing pages for current initiatives
• Design updates based on usage
• Provide new value (e.g., blog, resources, newsletter sign-up)

At the end of the day, these updates should meet one of two goals. They should either make your site more relevant to the current state of your business, OR better support your marketing and sales efforts. What most people don't realize is that three well-targeted updates per quarter will outperform one major redesign every three years — both in cost and conversion impact.

Tip #2: Keep Craft updated

This might sound overly simple, but the importance of keeping your content management system (CMS) updated can’t be overstated.

Just because a new version is coming out doesn't mean that you have to immediately make the switch. But remember that if you hold off through multiple versions, updating can become a major project. We see this constantly with clients who skip two or more major versions — what should be a day of work becomes a week-long migration.

Last year, we worked on updating a site for a client who had waited entirely too long to take action (think: months or years). Because of this, the scope of the project was much bigger than they anticipated and almost felt like starting over.

Updating to Craft 5

At the time of writing this, most established sites are still running Craft 3 or Craft 4. Craft 5 was released in 2024 and is now the current version, which means sites on older versions need a clear upgrade path. For teams managing Craft CMS development, the jump from Craft 3 (which reached end of life) to Craft 5 is significant.

The update from Craft 3 to Craft 5 requires attention to detail. For example, all 3rd party plugins need to be updated or replaced first. Sounds simple at first, but remember that sometimes plugins get abandoned. This means that just clicking "update" isn't possible and you need to figure out an alternative upgrade path or custom solution.

Whether you DIY or enlist the help of a web development team like Good Work, keeping your CMS updated in a timely fashion is key. Don't wait until you're forced to upgrade under pressure — plan the migration when you have time to test properly.

Tip #3: Schedule regular website audits

When your website continually evolves and you’re doing regular updates to your CMS, you have to check in and ensure that everything is working in the background as it’s supposed to. In the fast-paced environment that is digital, regularly scheduled website audits are required to have a seat at the table.

How often should audits occur?

At a minimum, standard marketing websites should have an audit every 4-6 months, while websites that have a constant stream of new content and updates might need audits every month. E-commerce sites or lead-generation sites with paid traffic should lean toward quarterly audits at minimum.

What are the most important things to audit?

There is no one-size fits all answer to this, but website audits come in a variety of shapes and sizes. The ones we find most useful are geared toward (1) Accessibility, (2) Technical SEO and Speed, and (3) Design.

Testing the right blend of infrastructure updates, website audits, and continuous improvements is viable in ensuring our website brings the most value to our business at any given time.

Accessibility

Evaluating accessibility is not just an optional, nice-to-have aspect of your website. It is important to ensure that all potential users – including those with disabilities – have a decent user experience. But when you implement these accessibility best practices and ensure easy access to your information, you improve the usability for all site users. In our experience, the majority of accessibility fixes also improve mobile usability and search engine crawlability — solving multiple problems at once.

DIY Accessibility online checkers we recommend:

• Accessibe
• WAVE
• Web Accessibility by Level Access

Maintenance: Speed and SEO

Site speed and SEO are two different things, but both play a significant role in how search engines like Google evaluate your site, and how they show up in search results. Google now uses Core Web Vitals as a confirmed ranking factor, and in 2024, Interaction to Next Paint (INP) replaced First Input Delay (FID) as the key responsiveness metric.

Sometimes updates inadvertently slow down the site. Adding media is a common culprit to this. Other times, it is inaction that can cause issues, in the case of things like broken links or meta information updates.

DIY speed and SEO tools we recommend:

• Ahrefs
• Google Lighthouse
• SEMRUSH

Design

Finally, consider how design audits can play a role in improving your site. Your designer will often have suggestions on how to improve conversions without needing a total redo. What most companies miss is that small visual hierarchy changes — button placement, headline contrast, whitespace adjustments — can shift conversion rates by 15-30% without touching a line of code.

This is one area we recommend going straight to the professionals in the audit process. It is important to weigh the effort vs. outcomes in design work so that you don't end up going down a rabbit trail that leaves your site pretty, but the update is neutral in terms of conversions.

You don’t have to go it alone

These three tips are a great way to implement continuous improvement to your website and can keep it fresh and relevant much longer without the need to start over.

But knowing what to do, and actually finding the time to do it are two different things. If you’re ready to hand the keys over to the experts, we’d love to help.

We offer maintenance plans that provide relief. Have confidence you’ve got the support you need and get back to doing what you do best for your company.

Schedule a call today.