With a new year there comes new trends. Recently, I have come to find that designers are replacing the hard, and somewhat sterile appearance of some websites with color, graphics, and big personalities. “Designing for delight”. Whether it’s using hand-drawn elements, a reference to retro design, or aging your images, text, and logos with texture.
First thing’s first: cut the text and amp up the graphics. Studies have shown that viewers navigate away from sites with text consuming pages, decreasing you pool of clients. Instead of long pages of copy, summarize what you are trying to convey with a graphic chart. When it come to text: less is more.
It’s always been about aesthetics. What will catch the viewer’s eye and keep them on your site? The answer is a fresh design. Draw them with bold color, quirky icons, large images, and maybe even a detailed graphic footer with a large height. Look back to those old 50’s advertisements. Use those lines, fonts, and color, and sell your business like they sold that can of peaches.
Some more recent web designs have taken to using one long front page containing all of their information with a fixed horizontal navigation bar in the header, allowing the viewer to easily browse the site while having some fun while doing it.
There is also a needed element of personality. A viewer wants to feel like they are interacting with a human, not a computer. Make sure your branding shows your individuality. What makes your business stand out from the crowd? Give your site some life. Some wit. Some identity.
Maybe my biggest suggestion can be summed up with a few pretty useful cliches:
“Expand your horizons”
“The sky is the limit”
“You hold back, you stay back”
Just remember it all comes back to aesthetics. It has been scientifically proven that the human brain responds positively to a nice visual design. If your website is pleasing to the eye, then you’ve got your potential client’s attention! So, keep it light, organized, and fun – but beware of going overboard. No scrolling marquis, people.
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