What is the lifespan of a website?
My site was designed several years ago, and now I'm wondering if I should have my site redesigned. What is the average lifespan of a website before it needs to be redone?
Goodness knows websites have changed a lot site the first one launched back in the early 90s. The technology has grown immensely in the past 5 years, and even more rapidly in the most recent couple of years. Now more than ever, it is important to have a great website, as the web is most people's primary means to getting the information they need.Back in the day, websites were created using a code structure called 'tables.' In the early 2000s, a new type of code structure emerged that used divs and CSS in place of the former tables. This era is often referred to as Web 2.0. Divs and CSS remain as the backbone of today's websites, but currently there are a host of additional types of technology, such as the WordPress CMS and Javascript that are used to make websites even more beautiful and useful to their owners.
But technology wasn't the only thing that changed.
Along with the advent of these new technologies, came new styles of design that weren't originally possible. A really basic example of this is standard site width. Back in the 90s, websites were no more than 800 pixels in width (and often narrower) because monitors where quite small and clunky browsers ate up a lot of screen real estate. Now, the current standard is 960 pixels in width, with a lot of websites bucking the standards and experimenting with sites even wider than that. These wider widths are made possible by the affordability of larger monitors.Another way times have changed is the increased amount of devices we access the websites from. It used to be that you sat down at your desktop computer to go online. Nowadays, you've got tons of options to choose from. Desktop and laptop monitors cover a range of sizes and then there are also the smaller sizes of tablets and mobile phones to consider. With all these screen sizes to consider, its no wonder that responsive web design has become widely adopted by modern browsers as a solution that enables the ability to adapt your site content to the device being used, and serve up a better user experience.
Now that you've got the background info, lets return to the question of how long a website should last.
The fact is that there is no set rule for how long a website should last. However, if you site is older than 5 years, there is a pretty high chance that it should be redesigned. If it is younger than that and was built really well from the beginning, you might be able to make it last a little bit longer by doing a bit of realignment, rather than a full redesign.However, you can only stretch a site so far before it just makes good sense to start fresh and rethink it given today's technology and user needs. When it comes to such a large piece of your marketing as your website, it is easy to fall into thinking that you've spend so much time and money on it, it must last a really long time. Unfortunately that just isn't the case.Design and technology are continuing to change at warp-speed, and it is more important than ever to offer your customers a great experience on your site. With the advent of everything being online, it has raised the bar for design excellence, and users make judgement calls about your product or service based on the experience of your website.If you haven't redesigned your site in the last 5 years, or if you created your site yourself when you were just starting out, you might want to determine where a redesign might fall into your marketing plan in the next year. And if you've recently redesigned your website, make sure to take time regularly to evaluate it, making sure the content stays up-to-date and that necessary course corrections are made. This will help to extend the longevity of the site.
