Do I need a new website, or can mine be fixed?

Often the cheapest answer is to fix the website you have. Sometimes a rebuild saves money in the long run. Here’s how to tell which one you need — usually in about ten minutes.

Signs your site can be fixed

• You can still log in and update it. It’s built on something current, like WordPress or Shopify, and you (or someone you trust) have the login.
• The problems are specific. It’s slow, a form is broken, it looks off on phones, it’s missing from Google, or the information is out of date.
• Customers can still find what they need. The pages make sense; they just need tightening up.

Those are fixable. On my own site, fixing a single font-loading problem took the mobile speed score from 89 to 96. A fix for a site of up to 5 pages usually runs $500–$1,200.

Signs it’s time to rebuild

• Your business has changed. New services, a new kind of customer, or you now sell online. Chaé Manufacturing’s old site opened like a consumer brand when its real buyers were other brands; rebuilding it around those buyers brought 113% more leads after the relaunch.
• It doesn’t work on phones, and fixing that means redoing every page anyway.
• Nobody can update it. The person who built it is gone, it runs on software that can’t be safely updated, or every small change needs a developer.
• Every fix breaks something else, and patching it costs more each year than starting fresh would.

A redesign of up to 5 pages usually runs $1,200–$2,500, and a new website $1,500–$3,000.

How to decide in ten minutes

1. Run the free website check. It scores the basics — speed, phones, Google — in a few seconds.
2. Open your site on your phone. Can you find your phone number, prices or hours in a few seconds?
3. Check whether you can log in. If nobody can, that’s the first thing to solve — see who owns your website and domain.
4. Ask whether the site still describes your business. If it doesn’t, a fix won’t get you there.

A middle path

You don’t always have to choose. A common approach is to fix the urgent problems now — speed, phone layout, search basics — and plan a rebuild for your slow season. That keeps the site working while you save up for the bigger job.