Most website redesign delays aren’t caused by the agency. They’re caused by clients who weren’t ready when the project started. Content that isn’t written. Brand assets that can’t be found. Decision-makers who take two weeks to approve a design direction. These aren’t character flaws – they’re what happens when a business hasn’t had time to prepare.
Knowing how to prepare for a website redesign before your kickoff call can cut weeks off your timeline, reduce friction at every stage, and significantly improve the final result. The more organized you are going in, the more your agency can focus on design and strategy rather than chasing you for a headshot.
This guide covers everything you should have ready before your redesign begins.
Step 1: Define What You Actually Want to Achieve
The single most valuable thing you can do before a redesign is get clear on your goals – not vague goals like “a better website,” but specific, measurable ones.
Ask yourself:
- What is the primary problem with the current site? (Looks outdated, doesn’t rank on Google, doesn’t convert visitors, isn’t mobile-friendly)
- What does success look like six months after launch? (More inbound leads, better conversion rate, specific keyword rankings)
- Who is the primary audience for the new site? What do they need to find quickly?
- Are there specific pages that need the most attention?
Write these down before your first agency call. A good agency will ask you these questions in discovery – but if you arrive with clear answers, the project starts on much firmer ground.
What to Avoid
Vague direction like “make it look more modern” or “I want something cleaner” gives designers nothing to work with and leads to multiple rounds of revision. The more specific your goals, the faster the design team can deliver something that actually hits the mark.
Step 2: Conduct a Basic Audit of Your Current Site
Before anything new is built, you need to understand what you already have – what’s working, what isn’t, and what needs to be preserved.
Pull Your Analytics Data
Log into Google Analytics (GA4) and export the following for the past 12 months:
- Top 20 pages by traffic
- Bounce rates by page
- Conversion events and goal completions
- Traffic sources (organic, direct, referral, paid)
This data tells you which pages your current visitors actually value – and which ones you should be careful not to accidentally break or remove in the redesign.
Check Google Search Console
Google Search Console shows you which search queries are bringing visitors to your site. Export your top keywords and the pages they’re associated with. These are rankings you’ve earned over time, and protecting them during the redesign is critical. Google’s Search Console Help Center provides setup instructions if you haven’t configured it yet.
If you don’t currently have Search Console set up, do that now – you’ll need it for the post-launch monitoring phase regardless.
Create a Page Inventory
Make a simple spreadsheet listing every page on your current site. For each page, note:
– URL
– Page title
– Monthly traffic (from Analytics)
– Keep / update / remove
This document becomes your redirect map later – one of the most important technical documents in the entire redesign project.
Step 3: Gather Your Brand Assets
Nothing slows a design phase down like waiting for brand assets. Gather everything into a shared folder before kickoff:
Logo files: You need vector formats (SVG or AI files), not just a PNG screenshot from your website. If you only have low-resolution versions, flag this early – the agency may need to redraw your logo.
Brand guidelines: If you have a documented brand guide (color palette, fonts, spacing rules), share it. If you don’t have one, note your hex color codes and any fonts you know you’re using.
Photography: Collect all professional photos of your team, products, or facilities in the highest resolution available. If photos are outdated or low quality, budget for new photography before or during the redesign – it makes a bigger difference than most business owners expect.
Existing copy documents: If you have approved copy anywhere – in a previous website, in sales decks, in your About page – compile it. Even if you’re rewriting everything, having the existing copy as a starting point saves time.
Step 4: Decide on Your Content Strategy Before the Website Redesign Build
Content is where redesigns stall most often. The designers are ready. The developers are waiting. And the client hasn’t written the new homepage copy yet.
What to Decide Before Kickoff
- Will you write the copy yourself, or will the agency write it?
- If you’re writing it: set aside dedicated time in weeks two and three of the project to have it ready
- If the agency is writing it: plan a content interview call early in the project so they can capture your voice and details
- Which existing blog posts are worth migrating? Which need updating? Which should be retired?
The Content That Kills Timelines
The pages that most often hold up a project:
- About page: Business owners frequently change their minds about what they want here
- Team bios: Getting photos and bios from every team member requires coordinating multiple people
- Case studies or testimonials: Requires reaching out to clients for approval, which can take weeks
- Services pages: Deciding exactly how to describe and position each service takes more thought than most owners anticipate
Start on all of these now, before your project begins. Even rough drafts help the design team move forward.
Step 5: Make Technical Decisions Early
There are a few technical decisions that will affect every other aspect of your redesign. These are best made before day one, not during development.
Platform Choice
Are you staying on your current platform (WordPress, Squarespace, etc.) or switching? This decision affects timeline, cost, and content migration complexity. Your agency will have recommendations, but having a position going in saves time.
Our article on WordPress vs. custom development can help you think through the platform question if you’re undecided.
Hosting
Is your current hosting adequate for the new site, or does it need to be upgraded? Agencies will tell you if your hosting is a problem – but if you know it’s slow or unreliable, flag it early.
Domain and DNS Access
Make sure you have admin access to your domain registrar and DNS settings before the project starts. You’ll need this for launch day, and discovering that you can’t find the login credentials is a frustrating way to delay a launch.
Third-Party Integrations
Make a list of every tool your site connects to: CRM (HubSpot, Salesforce), email marketing (Mailchimp, Klaviyo), booking system, payment gateway, live chat, analytics. Your agency needs this list to build the correct integrations into the new site.
Step 6: Set Up Your Internal Decision-Making Process
One of the most common delay sources in redesign projects is unclear decision-making authority on the client side.
Identify One Primary Decision-Maker
Designs approved by committee take significantly longer than designs approved by one person with clear authority. Designate someone – ideally yourself or one trusted team member – who can make binding design decisions without requiring sign-off from multiple stakeholders.
This doesn’t mean others can’t give input. It means one person has final authority so the project can move forward.
Establish Response Time Expectations
Good agencies will ask you to respond to design reviews within a defined window – usually five to seven business days. Agree to this upfront and protect time on your calendar for it. Falling behind on a single review can push your launch date back by two weeks.
Prepare Your Stakeholders
If others in your organization will have opinions about the redesign (your business partner, a marketing team member, an investor), loop them in now – not during the design review. Managing stakeholder surprises mid-project is a significant source of delay and rework.
Step 7: Understand the SEO Stakes Before Your Website Redesign
If your current site has any organic search presence, protecting it during the redesign is critical. This is the technical area most often handled incorrectly in DIY and low-cost redesigns.
Before your project starts, understand:
- Which keywords your current site ranks for (Google Search Console)
- Which pages are driving that traffic
- That your agency will need to create a redirect map – every changed URL needs a 301 redirect to its new equivalent
A clean redirect map protects your Google rankings from the disruption of a domain-wide URL change. An agency that doesn’t mention this as part of their process is a concern.
For a complete SEO preservation checklist, see our website redesign checklist which walks through every SEO step from pre-launch to post-launch monitoring.
You can also read the broader context in our complete guide to website redesign for small businesses.
Your Pre-Redesign Readiness Checklist
Before your kickoff call, make sure you have:
- [ ] Clear goals defined (at least three specific, measurable outcomes)
- [ ] Google Analytics and Search Console data exported
- [ ] Page inventory spreadsheet created
- [ ] Brand assets gathered in a shared folder (logo vectors, photos, existing copy)
- [ ] Content strategy decided (who’s writing what, and by when)
- [ ] Platform decision confirmed or flagged as a topic for discussion
- [ ] Domain and DNS login credentials located
- [ ] Third-party integration list compiled
- [ ] Primary decision-maker designated
- [ ] Current team bios and headshots compiled
Arriving at your kickoff call with all of this ready doesn’t just make the project go faster – it signals to your agency that you’re an organized, prepared client. That’s the kind of relationship that produces the best outcomes.
Start the Conversation
The agencies that deliver the best redesign results are the ones whose clients come prepared. If you’re considering a redesign, the first step is a conversation about your current site and where you want to go.
Contact DevVerx for a free strategy call. We’ll help you understand what a redesign involves for your specific situation, and we’ll tell you honestly whether one is the right move right now – or whether a different approach makes more sense.
Clients like 1World Resources came to DevVerx with a site that wasn’t performing. We started with a thorough discovery process, and the project ran on time because everyone knew what was needed from day one.
Let’s make sure your redesign goes the same way.
