Need a new website but want to keep your current one live while you build? With Zibster Draft Websites, you can create an entirely new website behind the scenes while your existing website remains available to visitors.
Choose a fresh design, organize your pages, update your content, and review how everything works together. When your new website is ready, publish it to replace your current live website.
Draft Websites work at the website level. You prepare and publish a complete website, rather than publishing individual draft pages to your existing site.
Build First, Go Live When You Are Ready
Building a new website often takes more than one sitting. You may need time to choose images, rewrite your copy, organize your services, check links, and make sure everything feels connected.
Draft Websites give you a separate space to build your next website. Your current site stays live while you work, so you can take the time you need to prepare a complete experience.
This is helpful when you are:
- Giving your website a fresh design
- Rebranding your business
- Building a website around a new business direction
- Refreshing your images and messaging
- Rethinking your page structure and navigation
- Preparing a complete website for a new season
- Reviewing your new website with a team before launch
You can work through the details without showing visitors a website that is still under construction.
Plan Your New Website Behind the Scenes
A new website is an opportunity to think about what your business needs next.
Maybe your services have expanded. Maybe you are opening a new location, or your branding no longer reflects the experience you provide. You might need a clearer way to introduce your business and guide visitors toward an inquiry, appointment, or purchase.
Use your draft website to build that complete experience. Create the pages your new site needs, arrange your images, write your content, and make sure the navigation connects everything.
Those pages are part of your draft website. When you publish the finished website, they go live together as part of the replacement website.
Keep Your Current Website Working While You Build
A website redesign should not require putting your business on hold.
While you build your draft website, visitors can continue browsing your current live site and using its existing pages.
That gives you room to work through a larger change. You can develop a new homepage, refine your about page, organize your services, and select images that best represent your business, all within the new website you are preparing.
When the complete draft website is ready, you can publish it to become your live site.
Experiment With More Confidence
Sometimes you know your website needs a fresh direction, but you are not sure what the finished version should look like.
A draft website gives you room to explore.
Try a different design. Rethink your navigation. Rearrange your content. Test a stronger headline. Replace older images. Simplify your calls to action.
As you build, consider how each choice supports the website as a whole. Does the homepage introduce your business clearly? Do your product and service pages support that message? Is it easy for visitors to find the next step?
You can keep refining the new site while your current website remains live.
Review the Complete Visitor Experience
Before activating your draft website, review more than its appearance. Walk through the entire site as if you were a potential customer.
Ask yourself:
- Does the homepage clearly explain what my business offers?
- Is the navigation easy to follow?
- Do the images represent my business today?
- Is the copy easy to read and understand?
- Are my products, services, prices, and policies accurate?
- Are my contact information, hours, and location details correct?
- Do all buttons and links go to the correct places?
- Is there a clear next step for visitors?
- Does the website work well on desktop and mobile devices?
- Are page titles, descriptions, and image alt text complete?
Because you are activating a complete website, check every page you want visitors to use when the new site goes live.
Prepare Your Next Website Launch in Advance
Planning a rebrand or a website refresh for the new year? Draft Websites let you start building before your intended launch.
You can prepare updated images, new messaging, and a design that reflects where your business is headed. If seasonal products or services are central to your business, you can also build the new website around what you plan to promote.
Give yourself time to review the full site and coordinate your launch with your marketing. When everything is ready, publish the new website and begin sharing it.
Give Your Next Website Room to Come Together
Your website often creates a potential customer’s first impression of your business. Zibster Draft Websites let you build your next website while your current website keeps welcoming visitors and bringing in inquiries.
Start with the Zibster AI Website Creator to generate a draft in about 12 minutes, or build from a template of your choice. Build your pages, refresh your content, and review the details. Then publish the complete website when you are ready. Your previous website stays saved in your account.
Your visitors get a finished new website. You get the space to create it.
See how to create and publish a Draft Website
Prefer to have it done for you? Our Custom Website Design team can design your new website around your brand, your services, and the customers you want to reach.
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