What's the WHY of your website?

Sometimes we get so caught up in the frenzy of creating a new website that we forget ‘why’ we decided to build a new website. As your ED or CEO breathes down your neck asking questions like ‘How much?’, ‘Have you hired someone yet?’ and ‘When will it launch?!’ it’s hard to step back and ask the question you really should be asking: ‘Why are we doing this in the first place?’

Discover Your Why

When you’ve gotten to the point of declaring “Let’s redesign our website!” you’re probably there because something’s wrong with the current one. It’s too slow, you hate the backend or maybe it’s just ugly. Maybe all three!

A successful redesign is much more likely for organizations that understand the why behind the redesign. Don’t jump into a new website thinking it will just magically ‘figure itself out’ (oh if only!). For the most successful online transformation, you have to ask why before you start.

Two Questions to Find Your Why

What isn’t working? The best website is built with your priorities in mind. You can’t be confident in those priorities until you know what you’re trying to achieve. Is the crux of your problem that the website is missing essential elements? Or is it that it doesn’t align with your mission or your brand? These issues can spark a good, constructive conversation around what exactly you need to make your website reflect your mission.

What are my goals? Identifying your aspirations for the site as well as for your organization may seem like a daunting task. But, ask yourself ‘where do we want to be in 2 years? Or 5 years?’ and you’ll surprise yourself with the answers. Once you know what your goals are for the future, you can tailor your website to help you achieve them.

Why Your Questions Matter

Designing and developing a website isn’t all about schedule and budget (although that’s important too). It’s also about creating a tool that will tell your story, build trust with your audience and solve problems you may not even know you have.

If you ask the wrong questions at the beginning, there’s little chance you’ll get to an ending you're happy with. And that can lead to some, at best annoying, at worst costly, missteps.

Three things everybody wants to avoid:

Frequent Redesigns: A poorly designed (read: poorly thought out) website won’t age well and, worse, can get bloated with content very quickly. The branding such as colors, photos, and general layout, if not considered within the context of the organization’s overall look, can wither and become quickly outdated.

Unresolved Issues: A poorly designed website won’t address the issues you were trying to solve by redesigning in the first place. This can lead to irrelevant or missing information and a site that can’t grow with your organization and adapt to your evolving needs.

Outdated or Broken Tech: A poorly developed site or one developed on a platform that needs a lot of updates, can break frequently, causing your site to go down. And this means you’re paying your developer to fix it.

The best website for you is the one built with your goals and priorities in mind. You can’t be confident in those priorities until you ask the right questions and know what you’re trying to achieve. Once you have those questions answered, though, you are well on your way to building a website that will scale and adapt and will work for your organization for years to come.

Want to find your why but don't know where to start? Give us a call! We'll help you find it.