You’ve done it! You have the all-clear to start your museum website redesign. I’m willing to bet you already have a list of everything you hate about your current website. That makes it tempting to jump right into sketching wireframes or outlining site maps. Not so fast, partner! (That’s how we talk here in Nashville.) There are a few things you’ll want to do first to maximize your odds for a successful museum website redesign.
1. Talk to your stakeholders.
While your website might primarily be the realm of your marketing or communications team, it’s important, in one way or another, to just about every department at your organization. External stakeholders, like donors, members and other supporters, likely also have thoughts on how your site could be improved. Take time to sit down with each of your stakeholders and hear what their needs are. Ask questions like:
- What do you like about our current site? What is working for you?
- What do you find frustrating about it? Where do you feel it’s slowing your down or limiting you?
- What do you struggle to find or accomplish with the site today?
- What feedback or comments do you hear from visitors?
- How could our website make your job easier?
- What would you like to see in a new website?
It might help to have a short survey, especially for external stakeholders. Everyone appreciates having their opinion heard (and considered), so this is a crucial step to getting buy-in on the final product.
2. Prioritize what you heard from your stakeholders.
Everyone is going to have an opinion about your new website. Some will be thoughtful and insightful. Some will be personal preferences. The tricky part is to correctly determine which is which. Obviously not everything can be the most important. Plan on doing some prioritization and probably some elimination.
As a starting point, effective websites for museums and cultural institutions should prioritize:
- Clear paths to key actions like planning a visit, buying tickets, or joining as a member
- Accessibility and ease of use for all audiences
Ask yourself:
- What will make the biggest difference for visitors?
- What directly supports my museum’s goals?
- What needs to happen now, and what can wait?
3. Review your analytics.
When you’re making tough decisions about what gets top billing and what doesn’t, having objective evidence to support your position is the best way to avoid break room refrigerator-based retaliation. This is where analytics can help you. Take a look at your website visitor behavior. What content is viewed the most? What parts of your site are a ghost town? Consider evaluating:
- Most visited pages
- Least visited pages
- Highest exit pages
- Top landing pages
- Pages with lowest engagement rates
- The paths visitors take through the site
- Mobile vs. desktop usage
Keep in mind, analytics give you valuable clues, but they don’t always tell the full story on their own. A page might be your most visited page because it’s exactly what visitors need. Or it might rank highest simply because you placed it first in your navigation or featured it prominently on your homepage.
When reviewing your data, look deeper. Ask, is this page getting traffic because it solves a key visitor problem? Or is it getting traffic because it’s the easiest thing to click? Are people actually engaging with the content, or leaving quickly? Are they completing the action we want them to take?
In short, be sure you are evaluating both behavior and context. A high-traffic page with low conversions may signal confusion. A rarely visited page that supports a core goal may be buried in your information architecture. Your job is to determine whether the data reflects true demand or structural bias in how the site is organized.
4. Define your goals and metrics.
You know what your stakeholders want. You know how visitors are actually behaving on your site. Now it’s time to think about what you want to happen. Are you aiming for an increase in donations? More online ticket sales? Better event promotion?
Once you know your ultimate desired outcomes, what metrics will you use to measure your progress? Organic search traffic, length of sessions, page views, etc.? Achieving the goals of your museum website redesign starts with clearly defining those goals and laying out benchmarks on the path to success.
Get to work!
Piece of cake, right? While none of these steps are the most glamorous part of your museum website redesign, they are crucial to getting a new website that not only looks great, but adds real business value.
If you’d like some help working through these steps, check out our website design services for museums and cultural institutions.
