If the average website lifespan is 2 years 7 months, there’s a decent chance that your business is already overdue a website takeover. I’m sure you have learned valuable lessons about your site in its current form. Lessons from the analytics data, or simply from your everyday experience working with the website. You may have formed some opinions about how it could better serve your customers or your business. In our fast-paced digital landscape, where design trends, user expectations, and technological advancements evolve rapidly, you can’t afford to passively put up with the missed opportunities that an underperforming website represents. It may be time to call in some experts.

Handing your website over to a web agency can be a daunting prospect. Get that handover right, though, and the process can run smoothly and safely, breathe new life into your online presence, and achieve great results for your business. Here’s what to expect, and what to look for in an agency partner, so you can get the expert intervention your business deserves.

1. Initial Consultation and Assessment

When you first approach a development agency, the process typically starts with an initial consultation. Here’s what you can expect:

• Comprehensive Site Audit: The agency will conduct a thorough audit of your current website to identify its strengths and weaknesses. This includes assessing its performance, SEO, content quality, and security.
• Understanding Your Goals: The agency will take the time to understand your business goals, target audience, and specific needs. This ensures that any updates or redesigns align with your vision and objectives.

2. Transparent Communication and Planning

Clear communication is crucial in any successful project. Look for an agency that prioritises transparency and collaboration:

• Detailed Action Plan: The agency should provide a detailed action plan outlining the steps they will take to improve your website. This plan should include timelines, milestones, and a breakdown of costs.
• Regular Updates: Expect regular updates and check-ins throughout the project. A good agency will keep you informed about progress, address any concerns, and be open to feedback. This will typically be handled within a project management platform (eg. Asana, Clickup), giving convenient, centralised access to all feedback, decisions, estimates, deadlines.

3. Focus on Editing Experience

One of the key aspects of a successful website overhaul is ensuring user-friendly content management. Here’s how a competent agency handles this:

• Simplified User Interface: The agency will streamline the backend of your website by removing unnecessary options and features. This makes content management easier, freeing you of distractions, pitfalls, and option paralysis.
• Custom Blocks: Blocks are the new norm in WordPress content creation: reusable components that free you from the shackles of inflexible, pre-prescribed page templates. A skilled agency won’t lazily unleash upon you a dizzying profusion of off-the-shelf blocks. These fall flat by trying to be all things to all people, and the bloat just muddies the water. Instead, look for an agency with the skills to develop bespoke blocks, tailored to your specific needs. This reduces reliance on third party tools and code, guarantees visual cohesion along brand guidelines, and makes for a frictionless editing experience.
• Training and Support: A reputable agency will provide training and documentation to ensure you are comfortable using the new tools and features. They should offer ongoing support to address any issues that arise after launch.

4. Design and Development Process

The design and development phase is where your website starts to take shape. Here’s what you can expect:

• Improved UX: Depending on the scope of the takeover, the agency may create an all-encompassing redesign, or look for small but impactful wins to enhance the existing site, in efforts to improve the user experience across all devices.
• Staging environment: Expect ongoing work to be deployed to a hidden ‘staging’ site for you to review progress and prepare for launch by familiarising yourself and composing new content.
• Rigorous Testing: Before launching the new site, the agency will conduct extensive testing to ensure everything works correctly. This includes cross-browser testing, mobile testing, and accessibility checks.

5. SEO and Performance Optimization

A crucial aspect of a successful website is its visibility in search engines and its performance. Here’s how the agency will approach this:

• SEO Best Practices: The agency will optimise your site for search engines by fixing SEO issues identified during the initial audit. This can take the form of generating previously overlooked meta tags, cleaning up sitemaps, handling redirections, and improving the fundamental semantic structure of the site.
• Performance Enhancements: Expect improvements in your site’s load times through techniques like minimising CSS and JavaScript, leveraging browser caching, and using a content delivery network (CDN). This helps provide a better user experience and, as such, directly impacts your search engine rankings.
• Security Measures: The agency will implement strong security measures to protect your site from potential threats. A quality agency choses third party plugins selectively and sparingly, and keeps them updated. Other measures include monitoring for suspicious activity, and tightening access by implementing Two-factor Authentication for site admins.

6. Launch and Post-Launch Support

Launching a new or upgraded website is an exciting milestone. Here’s what to anticipate during this phase:

• Smooth Transition: The agency will ensure a smooth transition by carefully planning the launch to minimise downtime. This may involve migrating your site to a new server, updating DNS settings, and ensuring backups are in place.
• Post-Launch Monitoring: After the launch, the agency should provide ongoing support to address any issues that arise. This includes monitoring site performance, making necessary updates, and offering additional training if needed.

7. Continuous Improvement and Partnership

A website is not a one-time project but an ongoing asset that needs regular attention – ideally also regular innovation. Even if you anticipate a one-off round of work on your existing site, designed to address just one or two clearly defined issues, you’ll invariably thank yourself later if you chose an agency that can become a long-term partner. Such an agency can offer:

• Essential Maintenance: Your site’s software needs to be continually updated, and a good agency has the tools and knowledge to identify and fix any breaking changes that such updates can introduce.
• Proactive Monitoring: An agency partner will monitor your site’s performance over time and provide recommendations for improvements, in line with the latest industry trends and technologies.
• Technical support: A good agency will have the resources to respond to any issues, provide helpful guidance, or act as an expert sounding board. 
• Consistent enhancements: Your agency should dedicate some resources month on month to make improvements. They can make impactful suggestions and agree with you which ideas to implement, and when.

Choosing the Right Agency Partner

Negotiating a website takeover with a development agency is a big decision, because it’s a big opportunity. There are experts out there capable of transforming your underperforming website into an effective platform that drives your business forward. In summary, here are your key touchstones when selecting a web agency partner:

• Experience and expertise: Look for an agency with a proven track record in handling website takeovers and improving underperforming sites. Check their portfolio and client testimonials.
• Clear communication: Choose an agency that communicates clearly and regularly. They should be transparent about their processes, timelines, and costs.
• Focus on User Experience: This refers not only to your end user, but also to your in-house team. An agency that prioritises an intuitive editing experience and streamlined content management will make your life far easier and more independent in the long run.
• Reciprocal relationship: Try to invest in yourself by finding an agency that is similarly invested in the longterm success of your website. If you can agree on an ongoing program of continuous improvement, the agency essentially becomes an integral and highly valuable part of your team.