When should you modernise front-end?

The web world is moving fast and solutions that have been built a few years ago are quickly becoming outdated. Does it mean your company should throw away all of the work and investment made into those products and rebuild them from scratch? Not really, but you can’t neglect the importance of having a modern and fresh stack. So when should you consider to modernise?

Slow & Heavy

Poor web application performance might have a major impact on your users’ satisfaction, which will result in low conversion and fewer sales.  Usually, this is the result of a combination of many factors, including poor quality of the code, obsolete technology stack or serving too much data on your pages.

Complex and cumbersome code

You’ve realised that pace of maintaining of the app and further development of it is becoming more time consuming and expensive. You find it hard to find talent to work with your code, or even worse, your talent is leaving! As a matter of fact, developers rather than work with legacy code, prefer to experiment with new technologies. This requires having a solid plan for front-end architecture that will allow you to move swiftly. Starting with some Single page applications might be the first step.

Outdated usability

Do your current services offer visitors modern and clean design? Users now are expecting intuitive, easy to navigate online experiences. Having outdated UX of both consumer-facing means you are probably leaving money on the table. Also, don’t forget about your internal systems – using outdated systems affect your employees’ performance and make training very expensive.

No RWD or Mobile-first Approach

You’d be surprised how many web apps are still neglecting mobile experience, while data says it’s starting to exceed desktop in almost every market! Oh, and keep in mind various OS versions – you should test them regularly to make sure your app is usable there!

Summary

The reality is, building an application is only a first step. The serious problems emerge in time, and you constantly need to keep your eye on your product’s state. Being proactive will help you avoid most of the problems, but usually it’s too late. In that case, don’t panic. All you need is a proper roadmap and strategy – it will be painful at first, but eventually you will end up with a healthy stack, satisfied team and end users.