Website Design Trends 2014: Graphics Sell5963915

The internet is trending furiously since Google Hummingbird was released in the third quarter of 2013, and mobile use spiked late in 2013. Now everyone is scrambling to make the trends. Many of the new trends surround Typography and Graphics. That is because graphics sell. The fundamental purpose of a website is to sell products or services. The price of a website is secondary to its ability to sell. Low Cost Websites v.s. Best internet marketing There are still a lot of website design companies that can generate a website for a hundred pounds,give or take. These websites cut the cost of design by reducing the cost of graphics by eliminating the quantity and quality of images and typography. Creativity of Graphics Graphics are no longer photo-shopped images. The more common infographics become, the more creative graphic artists are becoming with graphics. Flat template designs are becoming popular because they create an ‘emotional response’ while keeping the design clean and reducing ‘clutter’ that might hide the message. When choosing a web designer the best question to ask is ‘how complicated is my message.’ If your product or service requires a lot of data to sell, then expect to invest a lot of money in your website’s graphics.

Quality of Graphics Graphic quality is increasing. This causes a problem because mobile requires fast loading websites. There is a fine balance between graphic quality and website speed. As PNG images are replacing jpegs, the business owner needs to find a company who can provide good quality graphics that load fast. Retina Ready graphics are made in response to Apple’s new Retina tool that increases the size of a graphic for easier reading. This requires a small image that is optimized so that it can increase in size when viewed on an ipad, or iphone. The Retina technology is here to stay. If your website is not retina ready today, you’ll need to redo it in a couple years – or fall behind technology.

Marketing Internet marketing is still a big part of graphics. Almost any graphic artist can create eye catching, creative, images. If the objective of the graphic is only to make people remember your website than this satisfies the purpose. If a website needs to establish a person as a professional, reputation management, or selling then the graphic needs to meet certain criteria. Colours and typography have specific purposes. Some incite emotions and increase the chances of a sale. Other colors impact a person’s reputation, then you need different colors. Even the layout has more impact. Flat Modern, and mobile layouts increase the presentation and ‘trust’ value of data. Graphic Trends That Are Disappearing – Flash -Headers The flash intro is a thing of the past. Adobe and Google’s attempted to make flash index ready. The experiment failed. Flash loads slow, and is difficult for the end user to easily edit. Today’s websites should be designed so the end user can customize it without having to hire another web designer. If not –t hen your website is about 5 years behind today’s technology. Large headers are also disappearing. Google has a penalty for large spaces at the top of websites. This was meant to discourage ‘made for advertising’ websites. Unfortunately, it also penalizes websites with 2” headers at the top.