Website Design or Redesign

Date: 05th June 2008

How old is the site, how was the site made, who wrote the site and where is it hosted? When was the last time it had a checkup or a redesign? Frequently I inspect and come across a website that has 0 backlinks pointing to the site, and 0 pages spidered and/or indexed by Google. This is problematic of course and although the client may wish to talk about website optimization I first need to recommend we take a step back; we need to determine the site architecture and to what extent the design is search engine friendly. If the site utilizes a frames design is the owner willing to consider a site redesign or come to terms with the site being compromised without a hope of attaining exceptional placements. Similarly how much of the site is in Flash? Is there a splash page? Be cautious of those low monthly all-in-one templates sites; they are challenging to optimize due to their inflexible architecture. If you are unsure ask the following: is there the capability to alter unique pages elements such as title tags, H1 (main) headers, description and other meta tags. Can one edit menu positioning, text navigation, image alt tags, layout of text, headers and footers? Does the site have a cms (contact management system)? Is access to its back end available? As regards e-comm templates we need to know where the shopping cart is located; is it part of the site or 3rd party?