My clients often ask – “When’s the right time to redesign a website?”
To which I always respond – “When there’s clear room for improvement.”
Contrary to popular belief, basing your website modifications and improvements on simple timeframes really isn’t the way to go. Just as one website that’s been running for five years could still be performing like a dream, another site launched just a month ago could be crashing and burning.
As a result, it’s up to you to determine when, where, and to what extent your site needs to be improved. Nevertheless, there are certain common motivations for redesigning a website, which includes the following:
Realistically, your own justification for redesigning your website can incorporate some, all, or none of the above. Irrespective of motivation, a website redesign could breathe new life into your business and deliver long-term gains.
Of course, there’s a difference between committing yourself to a redesign project and actually going about it. The latter typically being a somewhat daunting prospect. If you lack the experience and expertise necessary to conduct the update yourself, you’ll need to enlist professional support.
As for the process itself, the typical website redesign process takes place over a series of component stages as follows:
Taking a detailed look at your current website is important, in order to identify what you like, what you dislike, what’s working, and what could stand to be improved.
It’s then a case of considering how your competitors are performing, identifying their strengths, weaknesses, and any opportunities you could be capitalizing on.
Put yourself in the position of a fiction writer – how would you describe your perfect customer? The more detail you go into, the better the position you’ll be in to target them effectively.
Along with revamping your website’s current features and functionalities, what additional features and resources could be added to improve its appeal and performance? What can you do to make your site more accessible?
In conjunction with your own thoughts and opinions, studying analytical data will help you determine what’s worked well with your existing website and what could be hindering its performance.
At the earliest possible stage, you’ll need to establish exactly what you expect to get out of your new website. Are you looking to generate more leads? Pull in more traffic? Boost conversion rates?
You’ll also need to think carefully about how much you can afford to spend, along with how quickly or otherwise the project needs to be completed. Don’t underestimate the potential costs and consequences of lengthy downtime.
From start to finish, your website redesign project needs to be orchestrated in a manner that fulfills the objectives of your marketing strategy. SEO being a particularly important point of focus.
Typical costs associated with redesigning a website simply don’t exist. It’s another question I encounter on a near-daily basis, but also a question I’m unable to answer. If you want to modify just a few basic elements of your website, you can do so for USD 200 – USD 500. If you want to transform your current site into the most spectacular and complicated website on earth, you could easily spend more than USD 50,000.
In any case, cutting corners on the single most important marketing tool you have really isn’t the way to go. Hence, the importance of setting a budget at the earliest possible stage and determining how much you can afford to spend.
In theory, porting your existing website and its content to a new home shouldn’t have a negative impact on its SEO clout in the long run. If anything, it should take your SEO strategy to the next level. Nevertheless, there are various common errors made along the way that can have a detrimental effect on a website’s SERP performance.
So whether planning a redesign or in the midst of redesigning your website, be mindful of the following mistakes you’ll want to avoid:
Always remember that most of the fabulously fancy visuals you add to your shiny-new website will technically be invisible to Google’s crawlers. In the wise words of Google’s official webmaster guidelines: “Try to use text instead of images to display important names, content, or links. The Google crawler doesn’t recognize text contained within images.” It’s one thing to make your new site look the part, but you also need to ensure its pages can be crawled and indexed accordingly.
Even if you’ve decided to go for a fresh start, you’ll still want to ensure you port your SEO content over to the new site…all of it. Blog posts, articles, general informative resources, and so on – every last word of content that could support your SEO profile. Feel free to leave anything you’re not happy with out of the equation, but be sure to transfer the rest.
Or if not forgetting, not showing them sufficient priority. Don’t let it slip your mind that the average consumer now spends approximately 70% of their time online at the helm of a mobile device. Something Google knows and acknowledges, demonstrating a preference to websites that do the business for mobile audiences. If your new website isn’t consummately mobile-friendly, your SEO performance will suffer.
The more complex and feature-rich the website, the more difficult it becomes to guarantee the fastest possible loading times. Hence, you need to balance visual prowess with functionality and performance. Intensive optimization of your website’s coding and general key texture can ensure it delivers a smooth and seamless experience, irrespective of how ‘heavy’ it may be. Nevertheless, this will almost certainly call for expert developer support.
Last but not least, it’s worth remembering that Google is one of the many leading names to take an active stance against the use of pop-ups. It, therefore, stands to reason that the more pop-ups you throw at your visitors, the less likely you are to appear prominently in the SERP rankings. In any case, Pop-ups have little to no effect on 21st-century audiences – unless your goal is to drive them the way of your competitors.
Author: Giulia, UX/UI Designer, Sondora Marketing
5 Keynote and PowerPoint Presentation design trends in 2019PowerPoint presentations are the simplest way to express business ideas and stories as they can be customized to increase attractiveness. With the latest improvements introduced by Microsoft in PowerPoint 2019, users can now prepare and design presentations in a unique manner. After you have selected your desired topic and have notes ready, next is the process to create an appealing PowerPoint design which can help you achieve excellent outcomes.
Although the design patterns being used in 2018 were attractive and helped business owners to boost their sales through product marketing, there are still some improvements yet to be considered. The design trends explained in this article will surely help you in describing your objectives clearly and gather audience attention as well.
Starting with an essential aspect of making PowerPoint presentations interesting, Simplicity can help you achieve excellent outcomes. Sharp colors and background illuminations can make it difficult for the viewers to focus on content as it creates unwanted distractions. PowerPoint slides can be created in both horizontal and vertical manner which can be customized in many ways. Presentations are meant to be persuasive and are designed to persuade the audience for taking decisive actions. Make sure you have selected the goal of your presentation so that you can change the perspective of your audience as well.
Although there are a handful of useful tools available at PowerPoint and Keynote, each of them is not meant to be utilized while designing your presentation. Starting with the initial design phase, try to change the predefined font and styles as they are quite commonly being used in the routine. Make use of bullets, points, and shapes, where necessary, because it makes it easier to express your primary objective.
Example:
Using dark backgrounds and sharp colors in PowerPoint slides have now become a thing of the past. Considering the latest trends, colors such as light blue, green and white are now commonly being used because they make it easy to comprehend the content. There are loads of new and stylish templates available at PowerPoint 2018 which allow the users to create animations and multiple slide transitions. In order to keep your listeners on the track, using high-quality graphics and photographs can prove to be of high support. Using 3-D graphics and animations is not advised because it makes the presentation challenging to manage for people who are not having enough technical knowledge.
Using the animations and graphics available in the software are certainly not advised because they have already been viewed by the audience. Try adding high definition images which look posed, staged or shot in a studio. Moreover, typography approach can now be used to find personality-infused fonts, animated text effects and typographic cover slides which are designed to make the whole project engaging.
Default slide size and predefined fonts in PowerPoint background are evidently not included in the latest trend list. Presentations must be appropriately aligned with correct height and width so that your text is readable. If you have some images or animations to be included, just resize your slides before inserting them to make them suitable. Determine the amount of detail which your content requires for which adding on-screen charts and animations can be a great idea. Just focus on data visualization, illustrations and typography to make your presentations better and enjoyable for the audience.
Coming over to font size and style, make sure the writing is not too large or quite small in any case. However, whatever the size you have chosen must be easy to comprehend so that audience can focus without any hassle. The fonts ranging from 24 to 36 are recommended for creating a PowerPoint presentation because they deliver the best readability for the audience.
Placing long texts in any presentation makes it annoying as the audience probably never wants to read a wall of content. Colorful embellishments and graphical effects in data visualizations can make a presentation worth focusing and memorable. By focusing on your brand identity, choose the layout, color scheme and style after proper research so that it matches with the text included in the presentation. Although coping with the latest PowerPoint trends might not be possible for everyone as there are a lot of complications that need to be handled.
Last but not least, icons play a vital role in enhancing the focus and attention of the audience. As it currently the highest used trend in 2018 for designing PowerPoint presentations, these small visual representations make the context understandable and exciting by all means.
In order to make your PowerPoint presentation compelling, using the ideal storytelling techniques can yield amazing outcomes. There is a lot of potential for storytelling for which you can also consult case studies and life events of famous entrepreneurs. Maintaining the attention of the audience is not possible in presentations which include a bunch of facts and figures. Just try to be realistic and find a real-life story relevant to your presentation topic.
Using techniques such as augmented reality can prove to be helpful in this regard as it makes storytelling easier. As it allows the audience to focus and pay attention to the critical parts of your presentations, they will automatically start to show interest and attention.
PowerPoint presentations are by far the most efficient and convenient way to express your ideas in a professional manner. With the never-ending improvements and features which have been delivered in Microsoft PowerPoint, creating presentations by focusing on the latest trends can undoubtedly yield amazing results. As they are supposed to make presentations interesting and develop a strong focus amongst the audience, business owners, professionals, and students can now express their ideas in a beautiful manner.
So, if you are excited to share your great thoughts and ideas through PowerPoint presentations, following the tips and trends explained in this article will surely support you by all means.
Keynote or PowerPoint? [The Complete, Unbiased Review 2019]
A PowerPoint or Keynote comparison to help you choose the best presentation software for your needs. Charts. Graphs. And everything presentation software. When Forethought’s Dennis Austin and Robert Gaskins coded “Presentation” for Macintosh computers in August 1984, little did they know PowerPoint would dominate the presentation software market share for over 25 years. Long before the first “PowerPoint or Keynote” debate would come up.
The goal was to empower corporate workers, students, event organizers, and their audiences to visualize oral presentations, making them more memorable, articulate and concise. And that’s what Microsoft had helped PowerPoint users accomplish since August 1987 when it bought Forethought out—PPT included.
However, advances in the technology have over time swayed chunks of PowerPoint users to Apple’s iWork solution, Keynote.
But does Keynote make the best PowerPoint alternative out there or is Microsoft’s presentation design program still the top choice? To rest the Keynote vs PowerPoint deliberation, you’d need to lay out each one’s strengths as well as shortcomings.
That way, you know what to expect from each live presentation program and what each can do to help you fulfill your presentation design needs without wasting precious time and jabbing your reputation.
Shall we?
Currently the most popular presentation software, PowerPoint ships as a standard solution within the Microsoft Office Suite. Microsoft has also made strides to make the program accessible on the fly by ingraining it in the cloud-based suite Office 365 as well as a stand-alone app for mobile devices.
PowerPoint is uber-popular for several reasons.
However, PowerPoint is not squeaky clean.
The presentation solution came to exist not too long ago and has since helped power Apple Keynote Events, Mac presentation software as well as IOS. Apple products’ enthusiasts praise Keynote for its fresh user-interface and perceive it to be more innovative than Microsoft’s presentation software.
But is it?
Despite its visual and functional appeal, Keynote is not perfect either.
Keynote or PowerPoint usage statistics and market share are scanty to find. But in 2009, a Forrester study documented Microsoft PowerPoint had a staggering 95% share of the presentation software market.
But online Slideshare software and collaborative PowerPoint alternatives such as Keynote, Ludus, and Google Slides were yet to come out.
Prezi launched the same year. Currently, the online presentation software provider claims to have over 100 million registered users. But only about 8,000 of Prezi users are corporate customers.
However, Apple has bundled Keynote into new, shipping Macs since October 2013 while PowerPoint is installed in over 1 billion PCs worldwide half of which are estimated to be actively using PPT.
According to G2 Crowd, more corporate users prefer to use PowerPoint for business compared to Keynote as shown below:
PowerPoint vs Keynote: 271 reviewers prefer Keynote for professional presentations compared to 1,306 reviewers that prefer PowerPoint
As discussed earlier, neither PowerPoint or Keynote is perfect, especially when it comes to creating graphics, photos, audio, and other objects to add zing and clarity to your presentation. So, what excellent presentation design tools can you use for that?
Here are some of the best presentation design tools.
Canva is a comprehensive graphics design software provider. You can use Canva presentation templates to create refreshing PowerPoint or Keynote presentations. Besides, Canva has a font, photo-editing and color palette tools to help presenters create outstanding presentation graphics.
With LiveSlides you can insert live web feeds into your presentation. The tool is available as an add-in for Keynote and PowerPoint. You can download and insert into your presentations to interact with your audience via Twitter feeds, engage them by embedding YouTube video, and even embed any website into PPT or Keynote slides.
The company helps presenters to create authentic, memorable and modifiable presentations as a design toolkit. Sketch can also be used to prototype ideas into interactive designs. Users can also invite teams to collaborate on a design before exporting the file to PowerPoint or Keynote.
Want a presentation design app for displaying charts and graphs in Keynote or PowerPoint?
Plotly is a white-label data visualization tool designed to help executives, data scientists, customers and designers work in collaboration, and showcase their data in graphs—without any need for coding experience
This Google Fonts alternative may be a good fit for you if you want to create custom presentation designs in the form of calligraphic works. With Calligraphr, you can download a template, modify it using your handwriting, and then convert it into a personalized font you can use with PowerPoint or Keynote.
One of the most frequently asked questions is whether a PC created PowerPoint file can run on a MacBook and vice versa.
Well, before the release of Windows 2007, PowerPoint for both Windows (2007) and Mac (2008) saved the presentation program’s files in .ppt format. Since then, both save PPT files in .pptx formats.
Still, both are not seamlessly compatible. Even trying to view a PowerPoint file on a PC—which was created on a Mac—scrambles the font and layout. Keynote also doesn’t support Visual Basic.
Moreover, converted files tend to have inaccurate timelines for animations. One way to solve such an issue is to find the best Windows compatible fonts for Mac and using those.
As far as collaboration goes, Apple recommends uploading the file to iCloud or Box; other team members can then log into their respective accounts using PC web browsers so they can access the presentations you made in Keynote.
The Cupertino tech giant also put up a comprehensive Keynote/PowerPoint conversion checklist so you can find out what features Macs and IOS devices will maintain as you intended and which ones could distort.
Another way to find in-depth presentation software insights to help you address issues such as compatibility and customization options is to see the best presentation design books around.
Garr Reynold’s 2007 presentation design staple teaches how people aren’t wired to listen while simultaneously reading blocks of text spewing out of a projector. Learn how to appeal to the six senses and make outstanding presentations: design, symphony, story, empathy, meaning and play. And then he teaches you how to do it. The 2009 edition explains how to use multimedia and video in your presentations.
Nancy Duarte leaves no presentation stones unturned here. She spills the type of presentation design techniques she used with her firm to catapult Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth, to Oscar-winning glory. Expect to grasp the fundamentals of turning ideas into brilliant graphics, as well as diagramming and sketching techniques to win your audience.
Sip it all in as Edward R, Tufte spews presentation design wisdom in this industry textbook. Not only does he make it clear block upon block of text kill the audience’s concentration, but he also explains step by step about how to integrate brilliant graphics, captions, data, legends into presentations to win your audience’s trust and undivided attention.
Whichever industry you are in, David Sibbet’s Visual Meetings will jog you towards using new presentation design and technologies to rejuvenate your presentations. He goes into detail about how you can use new media to create business success. Expect graphics recording, storyboarding, idea mapping, and graphics templates illumination by the time you are through.
Resonating is the freeway to your audience’s minds and hearts. You want to present with razor-sharp focus, engage with confidence and communicate with clarity. Cliff Atkinson shares his collection of old-gold communication techniques and how to blend them into your PowerPoint presentation designs and delivery with resounding success.
Lame presentations inspire walkouts while powerful ones inspire action and command the room with clarity and pizzazz. With these books, you can learn what makes people tick, the anatomy of phenomenal presentations, and how to use modern presentation design software powerfully and effectively.
You can still follow the most powerful presentation design influencers to learn even more elaborately how to inject zing and nurture support in your presentations.
Find out how to get your presentations design mojo back. Learn from Sondora how to benefit from fresh and refined motion graphics, virtual and augmented reality creations that turn boring slides into lively, clear and seductive presentations.
With over three presentation design books under his breathe—all acclaimed classics—Garr will inspire your creative buds to come up with authentic, resonating and actionable presentation ideas.
Nancy is also an accomplished presentation design geek who speaks lives what she teaches. She’ll show you to use presentation tools and new media to rock any target audiences.
The urban planner and freelance graphics designer’s work is only worth seeing, so:
Fresh from Hangzhou, China, Leo’s specialty is in motion graphics and brand design, perfect presentation designs to incorporate into your modish PowerPoint or Keynote files.
Exemplary creations on and offline make it easy to understand how Shawna has worked with Fortune 500 companies like Nike and Adobe to create genuinely exceptional illustration and visual designs.
Discover how over 85,600 followers found themselves in the velvety spectrum. Original. Bold. Concise. Words to live by.
A great Keynote or PowerPoint presentation design can help you educate with authority and clarity, engage with confidence and punch, and entertain in one swoop. The result is a successful presentation that is not only memorable to the audience but one that encourages action, whatever your call to action.
A presentation is both an art and technical science you’ll want to master if you are to craft great slides that compel effortlessly and affordable without tossing your reputation to the curb.
Sondora is your one-stop PowerPoint presentation design agency. You can also visualize out your wildest Keynote presentation design needs, and Sondora will work them to reality without you lifting a finger.
Expect a team of fresh talents and experienced presentation designers ready to help you inject life into your presentation software. Whatever your needs: motion graphics, virtual reality, augmented reality, or custom illustration and branding design.
Hit contact and see for yourself.
2020 Web Design Trends: 10 Stunning Web Design Trends to Totally HitFor a limited time, SONDORA MARKETING is offering a FREE SEO Audit to companies interested in assessing their current & potential organic visibility in order to build a robust content marketing & lead generation plan for 2020. Let’s get started?
If the last couple of months were setting a grade, then 2020 is all set to be a breathtaking experience in web design. Couple that with the advancement in display technology for devices most people use to consume web content and web designers will not go wrong to splash a dash of vibrant colors and creative mixes not tried before.
Some trends, such as gradients, are making a comeback although this time as dynamic gradients. That means if flat design decides to take a nap, it could die a sure death starting in 2020 (which is where hard-to-spot ghost buttons are headed). And dynamic gradients could take over the entire darn space – at least for a while.
But then again, with pioneers such as Google and Apple backing flat design, this year might see an injection of depth and color into the minimalist concept. Over the past couple of months, it has been evident flat design can accommodate splashes of deeper and more energetic colors when afforded the attention and experimental dash it deserves.
In any case, the vast majority of designers and developers are focusing their attention on two distinct areas of web design trends for 2020 and beyond:
With ecommerce having already taken over as the new norm for tens of millions of consumers, it’s all about giving the online shopper exactly what they want in terms of user experience/interface (UX/UI) and visual appeal. For the most part, the top ecommerce design trends for the immediate future at least focus on usability, speed, and simplicity. The quicker and easier it is to get their hands on whatever it is they want, the better.
Likewise, we’ve already entered an era where mobile web traffic has comfortably overtaken more traditional desktop traffic in many key regions. Globally, mobile traffic is responsible for approximately 52% of all web traffic. By the end of 2019, 63% of all mobile phone users will access the Internet primarily via their device. Hence, there’s never been a more important time to focus on the leading responsive design trends, approached entirely from the perspective of the end-user.
Taking a look at things at a more general level, there are several key web design trends that are already proving popular among developers worldwide. Some are continuations of existing trends, and others bring bold new features and functionalities into the mix.
But which can you expect to see the most of over the next couple of years?
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As more brands seek to stand out among a sea of competitors online, more website owners will continue to adopt bold and bright colors.
Think of supersaturation.
Not only are brilliant and deep colors immersive, but they are also attention-grabbers, which are something many online brands can use.
Not only that. Going against the grain, where most web designs have defaulted towards safe shades and shadows, demonstrates a brand’s forward-thinking, daring, and even eccentric personality. And, depending on that particular brand’s target market, that can be a great thing that induces loyalty and association.
It helps that more device screens are adopting In-Plane Switching (IPS) technology, which will make bold colors stand out beautifully for the world to enjoy.
Here’s an excellent example by Egwineco.com; see how they use bold colors to exemplify each can.
Looks crispy to me! Simple, effective, and the kind of stunning website design that makes you want to reach into the screen and grab the product. The inclusion of a simple serving suggestion adds further weight to the message.
That’s bold, no doubt.
And again, the very essence of simplicity in design. Simplicity, in general, is one of the top e-commerce design trends of recent years.
The use of bold colors also reflects the growing sophistication of consumer technology in general. These days, most everyday consumers carry ultra-powerful smartphones that are capable of displaying incredible eye-catching imagery. Bold and beautiful imagery has become the norm today’s consumer expects.
The video almost went big in 2017. But slow page load times are making it a tough-sell this far, seeing that slow web pages will make you lose readers (potential customers).
Yet motion graphics are pretty popular with readers across the board. So what is taking video’s place?
Animation. Animation. Animation.
There are a couple of ways the animation bug could bite:
These motion graphics tend to take up less time to load compared to outright motion pictures such as good-quality video (despite having a range of possible use cases).
Not only do these motion graphics add spunk and persona to your overall brand, when well executed, but also the integrated animations, GIFs, and custom illustrations can help illustrate what you stand for and tell your story—in a cool, clear and confident manner too.
Shopify illustrates how Polaris is meant to be a guiding light. Works better than photography here!
Of particular note for 2020 is mobile animation.
Mobile-first has been a web design trend for a while now, and mobile’s colossal uptake (over the desktop, no doubt) will continue to drive accelerated enthusiasm for the mobile animation to new heights from 2020.
Illustration, on the other hand, can make it easy for product brands to demonstrate to potential users how to use the product—or help the reader to preview a site’s pages.
Even e-commerce sites could use custom illustrations to help online shoppers navigate through product pages and see how a product works beforehand, how to configure filters and shopping carts and guide them to the checkout page.
Still, “serious” brands can utilize custom animation and illustration to inject fun and pizzazz into a buyers journey or sales funnel. Or to simply keep the reader’s attention while the page loads (such as dadadata.com does).
With advancements in web-based, AI and big data technologies, animation and 3D effects can swoop in to offer less stringent and bland data visualization. Then maybe more people would care to look up the numbers twice.
One of the only provisos with animations being the careful consideration of mobile site visitors. Depending on the size and nature of the device used, it may be difficult or even impossible to provide the same experience for mobile audiences.
Nevertheless, there are many ways to use animation to connect and cement stronger relationships with customers.
Think about it…
Most websites are grid-based, obsessively orderly bland fields were playing it safe is the order of the day. Not that well-arranged homepages are a sin, but in 2020, asymmetrical structures are receiving adoptions in a bold bid towards flourishing individuality, brutalism, and unbalanced fun and enthusiasm.
Personal websites, in particular, are increasingly taking this idea to titan levels. Broken-grid structures are especially appealing due to their perceived uniqueness and dogged assertiveness.
But there’s a need to tread carefully here.
Brands with significantly large amounts of live content might find deploying asymmetric design onsets a chaotic web experience for their readers. So, such a brand would do well to reconsider the idea and switch on to a more fitting yet personable design – if they are to keep users happy.
We might as well use dadadata.com again. They use a combination of asymmetric structure and dynamic background, which flows into action as you move your mouse’s pointer to browse:
How audacious is that (or how quickly things can get out of order, in a nice way)?
Of course, there is such a thing as taking even the most prevalent web design trends too far. The key to stunning website design when working with asymmetry lying (ironically) in balance. To create a sense of balance in an asymmetric design, it’s important to ensure that no part of the page is significantly ‘heavier’ than the rest. Using larger images is fine, under the condition that they are perfectly balanced with text, space, and other elements.
Irrespective of how complex or otherwise the design may be, the eye of the viewer always hits the larger on-page elements first, before traveling to its smaller accompanying elements.
Typography as visual is not entirely a new web design trend in 2020, now is it?
But while previous to 2020 typeface design made use of traditional san serif fonts to say it loud, the emerging crop of typefaces are set to be bolder, dogged and entirely hard to miss.
Sometimes words speak louder than the thousand words a photo might yell out. For those times, deploying big, bold and custom fonts to usher in more elaborate typefaces makes a ton of sense. With more tools and devices available to support custom fonts, 2020 is a big year to make bold statements that set you apart from the crowd.
Variable fonts are coming on strong as well. A variable font is fundamentally a single, dynamic font that changes to appear like multiple fonts.
Here is an excellent example by Typekit Blog.
OpenFormat is officially supporting the new trend. In fact, type designers can easily interpolate individual glyphs alongside up to 64,000 axes of variation—from width to weight and so on. So adventurous typeface designers will have a wide variety of options to play around with and flourish.
And, of course, typography counts for something for any online business that appreciates (wants, actually) to tap and leverage the power of search engine optimization by using targeted, yet well-designed keywords.
Nevertheless, there’s much to be said for simplicity and basic readability. Taking things to extremes with illegible fonts in a vain attempt to be creative can be off-putting and counterproductive. Then there’s the importance of balancing loud and proud typography with mobile responsiveness. The issue is that typography that does the business on a large desktop screen might not be quite as suitable for a tiny smartphone. Don’t shortchange your mobile visitors for the benefit of your desktop traffic.
Here is a web design trend born to solve the evergreen responsive design question.
In recent times, online brands have had to decide between creating a mobile-only or desktop-only site. And designers have had to configure those sites to detect what device a visitor is using, so the latter can be re-directed to a version of one website that suits their device size.
And while it has been official since 2017 that more people now browse the web through their mobile devices than on desktops, a smart CSS grid offers a brilliant option to flex one site into multiple versions to fit a user’s screen size (instead of opting for mobile-only web design). From the perspective of the end-user, this is by far one of the most important responsive design trends of recent years.
As touched upon previously, mobile web traffic volumes have already overtaken traditional desktop traffic in the majority of key markets worldwide. The fact that Google itself continues to demonstrate a strong commitment to mobile-friendly websites really says all that needs to be said.
The latest advance in responsive web design, CSS grids ensure every visitor is presented with the same high-quality experience irrespective of the size, type, and nature of the device used to access the website. The layout system allows the web owner to organize content into rows and columns that respond to the user’s screen size. What better way to demonstrate this than bring up a visual?
If you are wondering how to capitalize on this most important of 2020 Responsive Design Trends, Robin Rendle breaks the process down in this actionable post.
People love multimedia, and sites that host engaging multimedia content score higher than text-only webpages when it comes to engaging and retaining visitors.
But in the past, websites with rich content have had to suffer slower page-load times thanks to traditional file formats such as GIF, PNG, GIF, and other video formats. These formats have been notoriously anti-mobile.
Now Google recently made everyone aware they’ll soon be using mobile-first indexing results to rank websites. This statement doesn’t come as big news seeing the number of people using mobile devices quelled desktop traffic since two years ago.
What this means for website owners is it is time to make the early bird switch to responsive, mobile-first designs that put mobile prioritization at the heart of the design process – without sacrificing rich visual content that enchants visitors.
And that’s where SVG comes in.
These are vector images that scale with the size of a screen while upholding the quality of the original graphics. SVGs are not pixels, which is a significant contributor to their scalability aspect. Another critically important responsive design trend for today and for years to come, SVGs ensure the consistent quality of the user experience for all mobile visitors.
Rather than some getting the full website experience and others being shortchanged, SVGs are all about consistent mobile performance – essential in a mobile-first web society.
As more webmasters realize a website represents more than an online address, hand-drawn elements that add a unique sense of character to website pages will pop up more often.
This web design trend took off on the back of two other growing web design trends in recent times – bold typography and custom illustrations. But given the sophistication and technological advancement of most web design trends for 2020, what’s the appeal of hand drawings? Why not stick with the high-resolution imagery and photography more typically associated with stunning website design?
The short answer – hand drawings are both charming and human.
You can utilize hand drawings to enlighten, engage, and enchant while oozing personality and standing out from the crowd – a massive differentiator among the billions of quality websites choking for attention around the web.
Source: Enchanting Marketing by Henneke
Following the usual web design trends with 4k imagery and inspiring photography is always an option. Nevertheless, it’s important to consider one key fact:
21st-century web design is often too perfect.
Everything is far too immaculate and flawless to have been produced by anything but a machine. By contrast, throw a hand drawing into the mix, and you immediately add the human element to your pages. Particularly if the drawing is a little on the rough side – something most non-artists will relate to much better.
Anyone can shoot a bunch of beautiful photographs and then arrange them on a website. Nevertheless, it says something about your character (and that if your business) if you draw something by hand and display it with pride. Hire help to produce your pictures if you wish, but nothing says more about an online business than a hand-drawn picture or two from the team behind the scenes.
Attention spans are fleeting. And smart webmasters know they need to team up with progressive web designers to capture and lead an increasingly distracted readership.
With millions of devices hosting smart virtual assistants like Siri, Google Now and Cortana, more people are embracing voice over text. Primarily due to the convenience of speaking directly into a device, rather than taking the time to enter your queries or requests manually. Web developers can take advantage and treat busy audiences to less effort browsing by levering the more engaging voice-powered model.
Device screens are also becoming smaller and more crowded, and voice-powered models take up little (if any) space and personalize content delivery in a way text might not.
Things may have gotten off to a slow start, but the popularity of voice control/input is finally hitting its stride. The following statistics illustrate how and why voice is one of the most important web design trends for 2020 and beyond:
The introduction of voice-capable interfaces by mainstream businesses remains relatively slow. Nonetheless, evidence suggests it’s only a matter of time before voice takes over as the primary or exclusive input/control option for the masses.
The social media giant, Facebook, welcomed 2018 by releasing their predictions for social media trends to take off in the year ahead. Three among those were (Social) Augmented Reality, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning.
For UX designers looking beyond 2020, you’ll be enlightened to know the UI of tomorrow is headed towards doing away with the traditional homepage.
A bubbling trend is to swap it for more targeted and personalized landing pages geared along with use cases and context.
Advanced machine learning will help webmasters, web developers, and UX/UI designers to capture readers’ details based on their browser history and location, for example.
In turn, this information will help website owners, developers and designers to come up with relevant web pages that land individuals based on the kind of information, product or service they’d be looking for on say, an e-commerce website.
Artificial intelligence is no newcomer to the web design and development landscape. Any automated system whatsoever that provides a personalized experience based on the user’s preferences and perceived behaviors qualify as AI. Likewise, Adobe Sensei and TheGrid are offering a stack of tools to help designers move with speed to conquer this growing trend.
It’s just that further down the line, the average web user will begin to expect (and demand) far more multi-dimensional personalization of their online experiences. Online experiences where the websites they visit and interact with know what they want before they even realize it themselves.
Before material and flat design popped into the scene, stringent grid layouts with sharp edges ruled over the web design block.
We have seen in the past year big brands embrace organic designs with their soft, curved lines, shapes and patterns – true works of art meant to add a dash of authentic fun and help uncover the brand behind the design by humanizing them to the target audience.
Google’s rounded-edge designs flash to mind as a good example.
Towards the end of 2017, a new tide blew in that sought to redefine the traditional web design layout. The incoming results highlight a branch from good old static-print-design-like websites with organized, conformist layouts. The aim is to inspire originality and blatant individuality to foster a sense of belonging among target audiences.
(Source: https://www.nngroup.com/articles/brutalism-antidesign/)
From a mix of horizontal and vertical text to color clashing, you’ll recognize it when you see it because a website sporting the new look will have distinct asymmetrical visuals that are in open defiance to conservative website layouts.
In short, the site is brutally original (example 1 and example 2).
What’s more, Brutalism has always been associated with a certain sense of functionality and purpose, over and above unnecessary aesthetic extras. A theme reflected in one of the most popular web design trends for 2020 among everyday users – simplicity and accessibility. Brutalism has the potential to be eye-catching and engaging, but can also be used to create seamlessly functional websites that are all business.
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As web consumption devices and technology advances, more web designers are coming up with unique and creative works that will continue to dominate the top web design trends in 2020 and beyond.
Some of our top picks are already growing concepts such as web animation while others such as CSS grids will become some of the hottest web design developments over the next couple of months. However, what the long-term future holds for popular web design trends will continue to be determined by one thing and one thing alone:
“The preferences of the end-user.”
Theoretically, it’s possible that the tastes, preferences, and expectations of the typical web user could shift radically at any time. In doing so, laying to waste any number of web design trends previously considered superb. If consumers suddenly begin responding negatively to asymmetric layouts, for example, they’re out of the picture.
Then comes the inevitability of technology mapping-out the future web design as we know it. Right now, it’s all about mobile. Rapid advances in the sophistication of mobile technology have transformed the way the world accesses and interacts with websites. Voice-capable interfaces are also making their mark. A few years down the line, virtual reality could usher in an entirely new era of web design and development.
Still, it’s unlikely we’ll be seeing sweeping VR-influenced changes in web design trends over the next couple of years at least. For the time being, it’s a case of the ten trends detailed above, forming the cornerstones of truly stunning website design for today’s web user.
18 Reasons You Need a New Website
Simply owning and operating a basic website isn’t enough. It’s the approach you take to web design projects that determines the outcome. Even the best-looking websites out there don’t necessarily resonate with their target audiences nor they help you grow your business. Now more than ever, it’s about the total package of engaging content, mobile responsive design, and the all-around user experience. From time to time, every website needs to be tweaked and updated. Web development shouldn’t be viewed as a one-time-only job. Instead, the secret to creating the coolest websites around lies in continuous refinement and improvement. But if your website just isn’t up to scratch, it could be time to scrap the whole thing and head back to the drawing board.
If you’re generally quite happy with your website, it can be difficult to know when the time comes for a tune-up. Let alone a complete new-build of the whole thing. The problem is that just because you like your website doesn’t mean anyone else does. Never forget that your website is perhaps the single most important representative of your entire business online. If it doesn’t deliver a strong and memorable message, it’s game over. So rather than taking chances, an occasional audit of its value comes highly recommended.
It’s up to you whether you work with leading web design agencies or take the DIY approach, but periodic improvements to your website are mandatory.
So with this in mind, here’s a summary of 18 reasons why you may need a new website right now:
If you don’t already have a website, you’re in danger of disappearing entirely. Irrespective of the size or nature of your business, today’s consumer expects every brand to have a well presented and information-rich website. Hence, you need to get on the case as quickly as possible or run the risk of losing customers.
As touched upon, your website needs to deliver a strong and lasting first impression. Research has shown that you’ve got less than 7 seconds to win over every new visitor to your website. If they’re not immediately impressed by what they see, they won’t stick around to check out the rest of your business.
Chances are your competitors already have seriously impressive websites. Unless you find a way to outshine them with your own online offerings, you’ll struggle to gain a competitive edge. One-upmanship is the key to success with any online business venture. If you don’t provide your target audience with a more appealing offer, why would they choose you over your competitors?
If your current e-commerce platform doesn’t support the latest plug-ins and add-ons, you could be selling your business short. Consider carefully how dynamic and responsive your website is to the requirements and expectations of visitors. E-commerce websites that are not regularly updated almost always fall behind the pack.
Today’s web user has neither the time nor the inclination to deal with slow and sluggish websites. Instead, they’re willing to wait no more than 3 seconds for any specific page to load. Anything slower and they’ll head straight into the open arms of your competitors. If the back-end of your website doesn’t deliver the goods, you may need to start again from scratch.
The content you publish on your website will play a key role in determining if and to what extent your business succeeds. If your content is out of date, poorly written or generally uninspiring, it could be holding you and your business back. Quality content is the backbone of every successful website and should be prioritized.
It’s worth remembering that impulse purchases can contribute heavily to your total e-commerce revenues. The quicker and easier you make it for customers to convert, the more likely they are to do just that. By contrast, complex and drawn-out payment processes increase shopping cart abandonment rates. You need to do everything you can to streamline the payment process, eliminating complications where possible.
The importance of delivering outstanding mobile experience is hardly a new discovery. In fact, Google has been handing penalties to mobile-unfriendly websites for over three years. Given that more than half of all web searches are now carried out via mobile devices, you cannot afford to turn your back on mobile audiences. Instead, you need to ensure your website delivers a flawless experience for every visitor.
There’s only so much you can do with an existing website to improve its SEO performance. If you’re serious about climbing the ranks in the SERP listings, you might want to consider a fresh website from scratch. Powerful SEO elements can be woven into the fiber of a website during every step of the development process. Websites built from the ground up around effective SEO typically perform strongest in the SERP rankings. And you have slim and low-quality content you are guaranteed to have no organic traffic from Search Engines.
Of course, it could be that you don’t currently sell your products and services directly through your website. Rather than simply bolting a sales function on to your existing site, it could be more effective to build an entirely new e-commerce website from scratch. This way, you’ll have the opportunity to create a unified and cohesive online retail experience for your target audience. Bolt-ons are better than nothing, but a new purpose-built website could be even more effective.
It’s never nice to acknowledge a notable and continual decline in website traffic. Things may have been great at one time, but seem to have hit a downward spiral. If there’s no obvious explanation as to where you’re going wrong, it could simply be that your website doesn’t resonate with your audience. In which case, the solution is simple – invest in an all-new website, built from the ground up with your perfect customer in mind.
No website is immune to the attacks of cyber criminals. In fact, the likelihood of being targeted by fraudsters is at an all-time high. The question being – are you doing enough to safeguard both your online business and your customers? If the answer is no, it’s only a matter of time until you face the consequences. Hackers are becoming more sophisticated than ever before, which calls for enhanced diligence on the part of online business owners.
Under no circumstances should you ever build a website using cheap (or free) prefabricated templates. Along with coming across as amateurish, such websites are notorious for delivering a poor user experience, terrible SEO performance, and bloated code. Not to mention, the impossibility of creating a unique website that distinguishes you from your competitors. If your current website is essentially a clone of countless other websites, you need to think about starting from scratch.
Your navigation system will have a direct impact on how your website is interpreted and interacted with. Complex and confusing navigation systems are one of the biggest turn-offs for today’s web user. If they can’t find exactly what they need in seconds, they won’t bother searching any further. Consider the efficiency and effectiveness of your navigation system, along with how it may be affecting your performance as a business.
The days of Flash impressing online audiences are now confined to the history books. Today, Flash only stands to hinder the performance of your website, dilute your SEO strategy and make it impossible for mobile visitors to get any real value from your pages. On the whole, therefore, excessive use of Flash is to be avoided at all costs. If Flash plays a pivotal part in the design of your current website, it’s time for a rethink.
Social media has become a lifestyle for the 21st-century web user. Hence, it should be seamlessly integrated with your website. It’s up to you to make it quick and easy for your customers to head straight over to your social media profiles. Rather than seeing your website and social accounts as separate entities, they should be brought together to form one cohesive web presence.
Try to remember that every visitor to your website will make snap judgments based on visual content alone. If they’re put off by outdated imagery, everything else is inconsequential. Every image you add to your website should inspire and reassure your customers that they’ve come to the right place. If not, they’ll head someplace else – it’s as simple as that.
Last but not least, it could simply be that your current website is no longer an accurate representation of your company. You may have added new services, branched out into new product areas or simply evolved beyond what you once were. If this is the case, there’s really no better time to consider refreshing your online presence with a brand new website.
2019 Checklist – B2B Lead Generation Stats and Hints
Find out how to optimize that B2B website to generate quality leads and more sales here in this Blog post.
The best business website is not limited to good design. To make the most out of a B2B lead generation strategy, it has to provide several key elements that help convert visitors into buyers. The following statistics unearth the different perspectives, marketers have (or need like to) to make the most out of a corporate website.
Here are the considerations and stats every B2B marketer should know in 2019 (and beyond).
2019 B2B Website Checklist
Business owners and digital marketers will also want to carefully consider the kind of content they display on their business website—because their visitors care.
For example, is the website providing enough company information to boost trust and nurture newly-converted leads?
Here’s the essential content you need to checklist:
Using SEO will help leads find the business online through search engines.
The same applies to business websites that do not provide enough share buttons. Some social media benefits statistics to keep in mind:
While B2B website design matters by a large portion, it is not the only area of optimization for B2B lead generation. Search Engine Optimization, business content marketing, event marketing tools, social media integration, and marketing automation integration also play a big role. The statistics gathered above indicate what matters and where the opportunities lie when it comes to attracting more qualified business leads in 2019.
