We launched our new website earlier this week, a project that has been a long time coming. You know that saying about the cobbler’s children going barefoot because he was too busy fixing everyone else’s shoes? Boy can we relate! Being too busy to work on your own website is definitely a good problem to have, but push finally came to shove and we embarked on updating our own website.

1. What We Learned From Redoing Our Own Website
We launched our new website earlier this week,
a project that has been a long time coming. You
know that saying about the cobbler’s children
going barefoot because he was too busy fixing
everyone else’s shoes? Boy can we relate! Being
too busy to work on your own website is
definitely a good problem to have, but push
finally came to shove and we embarked on
updating our own website.
Now, here at ClearEdge, we pride ourselves on our processes and attention to detail.
One of the ways we ensure we deliver the best work for our clients is by following best
practices. So it was definitely a test to follow our own process as we worked on our
website! Here are a few of our key take-aways as we reflect back on our website
project:
1. Clear goals and objectives are a must. As we embarked on our website, we
had several key stakeholders that had a slightly different vision for the
website. Our clients run across this challenge every day so it give us a deeper
appreciation for making sure everyone’s voice is heard during the creative
briefing process, especially, and as the site is developed.
2. Timelines will be pushed – in our case, often! When we first embarked on this
project, our goal was to launch the site in November of 2012. That deadline
soon moved to December, then the first week of 2013, then…..well, you get
the picture. All kidding aside, we had to remind ourselves that a website will
never be “done” and that we could – and should! – continue to tweak, add and
improve once the site was live. So we drew a line in the sand, said “here’s our
launch date” and turned the key.
3. Following the established process is crucial. Given that we were working on
this site as we had time (client work always comes first!), it was tempting to do
things out of order just for the sake of getting to launch faster. However, there
are always drawbacks to taking a shortcut. So as painful as it was to follow the
process we use for our clients (not because it’s a bad process, but because it
actually forced us to slow down and be methodical in our thinking), we realized
it was for the best and would ensure we didn’t miss anything.
4. A picture can tell a thousand words. Being in the business of marketing, that
phrase is not new to us. However, as we pondered how to show the work we do
for our clients, we spent a significant amount of time working through which
pieces to profile. We wanted to ensure we put our best foot forward while at
the same time not laying all our cards on the table, so to speak. People are so
visual, and social media seems to be favoring pictures over words, so we
wanted to make sure our site overall was visually appealing.
5. Responsive design was the way to go…for us. A responsive approach to
building websites is gaining traction quickly, and several of our clients are
inquiring about this. As we counsel our clients on the benefits of responsive

2. design, we can say with confidence that we’ve gone through the decision-
making process ourselves and actually built our site that way. We’ll be
watching our analytics closely to see how responsive design impacts our SEO,
and will be able to share our personal experience with our clients. As a design
agency, it was critical that we could showcase the latest style of design and
functionality, which ultimately was our driving decision. But we also encourage
clients to look at their analytics and site traffic to see where visitors are
coming from, what percentage and if they truly believe their business and
consultant users will be majority mobile in next 1-2 years. While trends would
say yes, it’s not always right for every company to go responsive. Here’s a good
article: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/seo-of-responsive-web-design.
Website projects are a major undertaking and by going through this process ourselves,
we in essence put ourselves in the shoes of our clients, which is critical to do from
time to time. The good news is that this exercise enabled us to fine-tune our
processes, which will ultimately provide a better experience for our clients.
We’d love your feedback about our new website so take a look around and please
leave your comments below. And if you’re debating redoing your company’s website,
have questions about whether or not responsive design is right for you, wonder how
long projects typically take and cost, we’d love to have a conversation with you about
it. You can contact us here. Plus, if you’d like to see other examples of our work,
check out our portfolio.