Your organization’s website is more than just an online presence — it’s the cornerstone of your brand and a key driver of business success. A well-optimized, high-performing website will attract the right audience, deliver exceptional user experiences, and convert visitors into loyal customers. To stay competitive, investing in strategies and tools that ensure your site stands out and delivers measurable results is essential.
Optimized websites require constant maintenance and updating as technology advances and customer tastes change. (Imagine going to a website today that still uses a design from the early 90’s – it would be laughable and frustrating to navigate.) So, if it’s time to build or update your website, the experts at OneMagnify have some important suggestions about where you’ll need to invest.
Accessibility
First and foremost, build an accessible website so that users with disabilities can access your website – and avoid ADA-related lawsuits, which are on the rise every year.
By building an accessible website, you’ll address the needs of your users and your business. Be sure to design for mobile accessibility, screen reader compatibility, keyboard navigation, video captions, and color blindness. Consider bringing in an expert (OneMagnify can do this) to evaluate your website so that it is compliant and reaches the broadest possible audience for your business.
A Mobile and User-Friendly Design
Whether you’re designing your business website for the first time or redesigning to modernize your site, follow User-Centered Design (UCD) principles that prioritize your customers’ needs within the context of your business goals.
“Users will make snap judgements of websites that are poorly designed and difficult to use”
“Users will make snap judgements of websites that are poorly designed and difficult to use,” says Jean LeMay, Senior Manager of User Experience at OneMagnify. Make it easy for visitors to find what they need within 2 to 3 clicks by designing simple, easy navigation that’s consistent on mobile and desktop.
By focusing on simple design and clear, consistent navigation, you’ll ensure that customers find what they’re looking for and create a positive, memorable experience that will bring visitors back to your website.
Users searching for information on their smartphone expect fast access to relevant results. Whether it’s something as basic as what your product does or what your company offers, users should be able to find it quickly. “Over 50% of web traffic will come from a mobile device,” Jean notes. “You need to design your website to ensure that it’s mobile-friendly and responsive.”
“You want all the content on the desktop site to be visible on mobile views,” adds Felicia Adamczyk, Director of SEO & Performance Marketing at OneMagnify. “Don’t hide content from mobile users to save on page load times. Google crawls mobile-first, so you need to have a mobile-friendly design.”
SEO
Once your website is optimized and accessible, users still need to find it. As such, investing in search engine optimization (SEO) is vital. A website’s SEO can always be improved to optimize keyword targeting in metadata, improve page content, drive relevant links from third parties back to your domain, and ensure there are no technical issues that prevent search engines from crawling your domain.
SEO should be an ongoing effort as the way users search changes and the way the search results look evolves. For example, Google has introduced AI Overviews (AIOs) in the search results, and being listed as a source is one way to stay above the fold on results where the AIOs appear.
“Creating user-first, helpful content that answers questions and clearly provides the information your audience is looking for can increase the likelihood of being a source in the AI Overviews,” says Felicia.
If you’ve done SEO in the past but haven’t given it much thought since then, an SEO audit and strategy would give you insights to refresh your site’s optimization and build a plan to update your website continually.
Quality Content
While SEO will bring users to a website, the quality of your content will keep them there. One of the most important things you can invest in is original, high-quality content that speaks to your expertise, thought leadership, and value proposition.
“Lots of lower-quality websites push poorly written, AI-generated content, putting quantity over quality,” Felicia said. “You need to set yourself apart from the crowd with unique and authentic content that focuses on your brand and research data – AI content generators can’t push that out. It takes time, but it’s a worthy investment.”
While AI-powered tools are helpful for research, they can’t replace original content. You need content that aligns with your brand and unique value proposition, or else it’ll be a generic piece of fluff readers can find anywhere. OneMagnify advises investing in a team to identify what data you can share, what you can learn from it, and how you can use it to create truly unique content that shares your brand’s story.
Immersive Design
Content is king, but where it lives makes all the difference. Sure, LinkedIn or Medium can help spread your ideas, but your website is where your content should truly stand out. It shouldn’t just sit there, it needs to be actionable, immersive, and engaging, pulling people in and guiding them to discover more content.
Animations can help bring it all together. Smooth transitions, hover effects, and scroll interactions don’t just look cool—they make the experience feel alive and keep visitors hooked. And don’t forget to make it easy for people to find what they need. Clear navigation, smart suggestions, and a design that feels natural can turn casual visitors into loyal fans.
Your content can live anywhere, but it should work harder and feel unforgettable when it’s on your website.
Speed and Infrastructure
There once was a time when websites could take minutes at a time to load, one line at a time. Thankfully, those days are in the past – but some websites still struggle with poor speeds.
“Users typically wait 2 to 3 seconds before leaving a slow site” Jean states. Update your technology so that your website’s speed and load time are lightning-fast. As LeMay mentioned, designing and optimizing your site for mobile is critical, given more than half of all website traffic occurs on mobile devices.
Start by understanding what is happening on your current website:
- Run a speed test using Lighthouse or another tool
- Work with your development team/agency to identify what is causing speed issues – oversized images? Site infrastructure? Unnecessary javascript/css?
- Test fixes in a development environment to avoid any unintended consequences from cleaning up resources
Slow websites can be frustrating for users who are trying to find information or access services who are accustomed to fast internet speeds. They may also cause users to feel like they’re wasting precious time or create a lack of trust in the website’s safety. This is especially true for e-commerce or financial services where a slow experience may leave users wondering if their transactions were completed securely and completely.
Every aspect of your website matters, from the user-facing content and images to the keywords you target for search results. When you invest in your website to ensure it has great content, SEO, accessibility, speed, and design, you’ll be in a strong position for success.
OneMagnify
If you’re ready to update your website but need help ensuring it’s optimized, a partner like OneMagnify can help. OneMagnify’s team can work with your organization through every aspect of website optimization, ensuring accessibility, user-centered design, search engine optimization, quality content development, and more.
OneMagnify brings digital, technology, and data/analytics teams together to provide a holistic view of their clients’ websites. Every decision is based on data, including keyword volume, search rankings, opportunities for improvement, and performance measurements, so each change is informed and has measurable results.
