Are you considering an overhaul of your bank or credit union website? It's an intimidating task...and one you shouldn't rush. Your website is your front porch; it's the first place potential members or customers visit. Everything about your website - from the user experience to security - matters.
So, asking the right questions (and getting the right answers) is key. But what questions should you ask about your bank or credit union website redesign?
Start with these five crucial questions and get guidance on how to proceed.
1. What is a good approach to user experience (UX) design?
When making a bank or credit union website that is easy to use and interesting for users, the most important thing is user experience. A well-done UX design makes or breaks your site. Here are some things to look out for in your UX design process:
- Clear Language: Use straightforward language that is easy to understand. Avoid industry jargon and complex financial terms.
- Uncluttered Design: A clean, uncluttered design is key. Avoid excessive graphics or animations that can distract users from desired information.
- Responsive Design: In this digital age, your website must adapt to mobile devices. Perform testing to ensure everything looks right on phones.
- UX Planning: Create a site map, wireframes, and user menus. These tools help you structure the website's content and navigation before embarking on the full redesign.
2. What is the best content management system (CMS) to use?
Choosing a user-friendly and flexible CMS will make your website experience smooth long after the redesign ends. The right CMS can get your website to the next level and make it easier for your team to update content.
WordPress is a popular CMS choice for many financial institutions. It has more than 63% market share of the entire CMS market and offers more than 55,000 plugins. The extensive plugin library helps you connect to third-party applications and extend your website’s functionality to meet your specific needs.
Plus, WordPress is easy to use. On The Mark Strategies often gives short WordPress trainings following bank and credit union website redesigns, and everyone gets the hang of it pretty quickly.
3. What should website security look like?
Website security is a top priority for bank and credit union website redesigns. Security failures pose huge reputational risks, so you should know what you get with your new website.
But where do you start?
Begin with a secure hosting platform that offers robust data backups and implements encryption to protect those backups. For example, WP Engine (sitting on the backbone of Amazon Web Services) takes daily automated backups. At least 30 are always kept, stored in a secure location on a different server than the site is hosted on.
Additional security measures such as Wordfence offer real-time threat detection and brute-force login prevention. Other measures, like Global Edge Security, give you a firewall and DDOS mitigation.
4. How do we use video on our website?
Videos rule. People only scan copy these days, but they love watching videos. Some tips to make the most of videos on your bank or credit union website:
- Align videos with your marketing strategy (don’t just “do video” without a plan)
- Make sure your videos work on mobile devices
- Caption your videos for the deaf or those who simply have sound turned off
- Keep videos short and to the point
- Place videos only on key pages to avoid slowing down your site
More on that final point: it’s tempting to go all-in on videos, throwing them on every page imaginable. But site speed is vital. People often leave a site after a few seconds of buffering. Find the happy medium between video and load times.
5. How should we handle Spanish translations on our website?
Many bank and credit union websites are (rightly) making themselves more accessible to the Spanish-speaking population. This is a growing demographic, as well as one potentially underserved by many institutions.
That means it’s time to make a whole separate Spanish website…right? Wrong.
A separate Spanish website is an ambitious, costly endeavor. Creating one is often out of many organizations’ price ranges, and maintaining it frequently exceeds bandwidth capabilities. A Google Translate plugin is a better solution for bank or credit union website redesigns that want to serve Spanish speakers while staying realistic with their resources.
Have more questions you need answered? Email us to get information. Ready to embark on a website redesign? On The Mark Strategies performs multiple bank and credit union website redesigns a year. Book a free consultation today to get started.
