Website redesign
for Quebec small businesses
You already have a site, but it is slow, hard to edit, or it stopped bringing in enquiries. A redesign fixes the structure and the copy without starting from scratch and without losing what you have built up in Google.
When a redesign is worth it
These are not hard rules. If three of them sound familiar, a redesign is worth discussing.
The site is slow on phones
Open your analytics and look at the phone share: it is the only measurement that describes your own visitors. If the page takes more than three seconds to appear on that screen, some of them leave before reading anything.
You are hard to find in Google
Often the problem is not the content but the structure: duplicate titles, pages with no inbound link, no structured data.
A one-line change turns into a project
Correcting your opening hours should not take a quote, a ticket and three weeks of waiting. When a change that small is that heavy, the content setup was badly planned.
The site no longer describes what you do
Your offer has changed since launch. The site still describes the business you were four years ago.
What carries over
The most common worry before a redesign is losing Google rankings. Here is how that gets avoided.
Your page addresses
URLs that work are kept as they are. Those that must change get a 301 redirect, so Google passes the old page's value to the new one.
Your useful content
Pages that already receive traffic are identified before any work starts, then reworked rather than deleted.
The rankings you have
Titles, descriptions and tags on pages that perform are kept or improved, never replaced at random.
Your accounts
Domain, email and Google Business Profile stay yours. I work inside your accounts and you keep control.
How it runs
Audit of what exists
We look at what already works: visited pages, ranking keywords, forms in use. That list is what protects your existing results.
New structure
The page hierarchy and the copy get reworked. The goal is that a visitor understands your offer without hunting for it.
Build
The site is rebuilt by hand, without a page builder, starting from mobile.
Launch and redirects
Redirects go live on launch day, then rankings are monitored over the following weeks.
What a redesign includes
The starting point is not a mockup, it is your current site. Here is what the mandate covers, with nothing billed on top once the scope is agreed.
A full inventory of your current pages
Every address on the site is listed before anything is touched, along with the traffic it gets. That document is what decides which pages are kept, merged or redirected.
The 301 redirect plan
Every old address that disappears points at the one replacing it. Without that plan, a redesign turns ranking pages into 404s, and the visibility takes months to come back.
Keeping the titles that already work
Tags on pages that bring you people are kept exactly as they are. Only the ones doing nothing get rewritten, because a title that performs has no reason to change.
A rebuild in React and TypeScript
The site is recoded by hand and hosted on Vercel, with no WordPress and no page builder. There are no plugins left to update and no extension weighing down every page.
Page weight taken back to zero
Across the 36 Sherbrooke business sites I measured, the median home page weighed 975 kB and 17 of the 36 went over a megabyte. Images are resized and served in a modern format before launch, aiming at Google's own target: the largest visible element in under 2.5 seconds.
The phone version rebuilt first
Narrow screens are handled before the wide one. A redesign that keeps the opposite order reproduces exactly the flaw that made you ask for one.
A Law 25 compliant consent banner
If the current site drops cookies before asking, the redesign fixes that: nothing loads until the visitor has answered, and they can change their mind later.
Ranking monitoring after launch
The pages that were bringing you traffic are watched over the following weeks. A drop can be fixed while it is fresh; six months later it just looks like fate.
What a redesign does not fix
A redesign improves structure, speed and clarity. It does not replace a well-maintained Google Business Profile, customer reviews, or the time new content needs to rank. If your main problem is local visibility, we should talk before starting a redesign, because that may not be where the money should go first.
Common questions about a website redesign
Will I lose my Google rankings?
That is the number one worry and it is a fair one: a badly run redesign does lose them. What protects them is the inventory of current addresses done before anything is touched, then the 301 redirects placed on launch day. Pages that already bring you traffic keep their address where possible, and their titles where those work. Expect a few weeks of movement anyway, while Google reconciles the old and the new.
What does a website redesign cost?
A site starts at $500, and a redesign rarely lands below a new build: what exists has to be understood before it can be rebuilt. The amount depends on how many pages carry over, how much copy needs rewriting and how many redirects are involved. I give a price after the scoping call, never before.
How long does a redesign take?
Allow 7 to 14 days depending on the content. The timeline hangs mostly on what has to be rewritten: reworking a structure while keeping your copy moves fast, redoing both takes the top of that range. The inventory happens beforehand, while you gather your material.
Do I have to rewrite all my copy?
No. Pages that get visits are reworked, not thrown out. In practice a good share of the existing text still holds; what changes is the order it arrives in and the first sentence of each page. Sections describing an offer you no longer have do get rewritten.
My site is on WordPress. Can we keep it?
No, and it is better said up front. I do not take over an existing WordPress install: I rebuild the content on a hand-coded base. If what you need is to keep WordPress and have it maintained, I am not the right person, and you will hear that on the first call rather than after the quote.
How do I know a redesign is justified before paying?
The $99 web presence check exists for exactly that. I run your site, your Google listing and your social pages through an AI-assisted review, then hand you what is missing and where to start. The list is yours, whether you carry on with me or without me. You can also just send me your site address and I will tell you straight whether a few fixes would do.
Will a redesign fix my visibility problem?
Not on its own. In local search, your Google Business Profile and your reviews carry more weight than anything on your website. A redesign removes the obstacles: pages that are unreadable on a phone, a structure Google cannot follow, load times. But if your listing is empty and you have no reviews, that is where to start. Nobody can guarantee you a position, and anyone who does is selling you an illusion.
Related
Not sure whether to repair or rebuild?
Send me your current site address. I will tell you straight whether a redesign is justified or whether a few fixes would do.
Request a quoteSherbrooke, Estrie