TechAtLast

The internet is an ever-evolving thing. In years past, the hottest things were cheesy web animations and obnoxious flash banners. More recently the experts raged on about the use of tacky stock photos, flat design vs. skeuomorphic design, the death of scrolling web pages, and the use of big, big type to grab eyeballs and focus attention. In 2016, the debates are still raging, though there are a few trends that are proliferating so rapidly that a good number of newly created and recently redesigned websites are all starting to look like they were made by same person. What sort of techniques are we referring to? Consider these three things:

Common Web Design Themes That Are Causing Major Issue To User Experience

Web Devevelopment Project

Annoying (But Effective) Video Headers/Backgrounds.

You know of what we speak. You open a website, and –BAM– some loop video of a group of attractive young people starts auto-playing. They’re doing something important, or hanging out and laughing. They have some washed-out filter distorting the color of everything. They are so happy about what they’re doing you want to explode. In addition to making you fume, however, they also are making good use of one of the most effective communication tools available. The video is a quick and direct way to get visitors to a site introduced to what you do. There’s no denying that video backgrounds are striking and capture attention when done correctly, and as long as it’s done by a pro and visitors to your site have an internet connection strong enough to handle it, it’s a great thing to have.

JavaScript. JavaScript everywhere.

It’s cutting edge! It’s dynamic! It’s flashy! It’s killing your website! That’s right, even though you see everyone else doing it (even WordPress sites) that doesn’t mean you must. We know JavaScript is versatile and can be used to create cool web elements that other programming languages can’t. You still have to trim some of the fat. JavaScript can increase load times on your website (and annoy visitors in the process) especially if someone is using a mobile device to access your web page. From a security standpoint, JavaScript can be exploited if not implemented correctly. Why go through that “hackers stole our information!” headache if you don’t have to? Most importantly though, it’s shooting your local SEO efforts right in the gut, since whatever you have in there is ignored outright by search engines.

The Rise of the Blog.

You’ll recall in one of our previous articles that we mentioned having a plan to make use of social properly, which included doing a bit of blogging and supplying visitors with relevant content. All the designers must have gotten the memo, because it seems everyone (and their mother) has a blog on their sites these days. This is good, since it gives your visitors periodic updates of content and reason to keep coming back. The blog doesn’t even have to be extremely long. Just enough for visitors to your site to wet their beaks and feel that they read something interesting.

Of course, it’s still possible to make use of these and other overwhelmingly common themes and still end up with a website that’s all its own. Using a pro designer with a lot of experience is key. Sure, you could hop on over to Squarespace and churn out a cookie-cutter website in minutes. If you want it done right, with subtle-but-important details like user engagement, social media, and local SEO in mind you might want to go with someone who knows what they’re doing. Companies with community ties like Old City Press (Washington, DC), or Brown Box Branding (Seattle, WA) are leading the charge with some of the most impressive designs of 2016.

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