10 Web Design and UX Trends to Boost Conversions in 2017

Web design is one of the most important components of having a successful website and online business. This is now even more important, due to more people accessing the internet through a wide variation of devices like desktops, laptops, tablets and mobile devices.

While WordPress is one of the most used CMS platforms on the internet today and does a great job at making site themes and design responsive for easy viewing, there are other design specs and improvements that can still be made — especially when looking to increase conversions on a site.

This is exactly what we are going to be looking at today in this article today, which is based on the “Web Design and UX Trends to Boost Conversions in 2017” infographic design from The Deep End Design. Be sure to implement each of these design tips and trends into your online business to increase engagement and conversions across the board.

1 – Age Responsive Design

You probably already have a good idea of who your average site visitor is, but do you know what type of font size, navigation and style colors they like as well? With new kinds of metadata in the works, it’s now becoming possible to customize the experience of your site design to that of your audience (based on their age) and how they might prefer to view content on your site.

2 – Skeleton Screens

User experience is now all about how fast content can be displayed, while also making sure it fits the needs of your audiences. By loading a website in multiple stages (from simple to complex), you can have your site instantly load as fast as possible, then loading the more complex content a few seconds later. This will help with the instant gratification experience for visitors hitting your site.

Quick Tip:

Between 200 milliseconds and 1 second, people feel they are within the flow of their actions. After 1 second without any other feedback, focus starts to shift. Beyond 10 seconds, user focus is likely to be lost entirely. – SitePoint

2 – Engagement Bots

While the concepts of chatbots are nothing new, there are new and creative ways to engage with your audience being released all the time. To provide better customer service and increase sales, autopilots and chat windows can be used to help site visitors with any sales or form processes they might currently be working through.

4 – Shopping Cart Marketing

We all know the important of selling online and making the shopping cart experience as seamless and fast as possible. What many brands and businesses tend to forget is how much harder it is to gain a new customer, than bring back an existing one. With this in mind, offering upsells, bundled offers and cross-sales during checkout is a great way to increase revenue for nearly all customers on your site.

Expert Tip:

“Through the use of shopping cart optimization and adding an exit overlay to our client’s websites, we’ve seen conversions boost 4-5%. The response from customers being offered an additional 20% off was amazing. We also did internal testing on email follow-ups after the sale took place, and those who used the original exit coupon code also had better conversions on being a returning customer.”  – Website Designer Melbourne

5 – Animated Call-to-Action Buttons

Remember all the case studies on what the best text and color combinations were for check out buttons? Those are all standard best practices now. However, what’s new and exciting is playing around with check-out and call-to-action buttons that can be animated to spark just a little more interest. Don’t go too crazy with your animations, as you always want the end customer to feel comfortable and safe when buying anything online!

6 – Cinemagraph Hero Images

It’s already a no-brainer how well a mascot, cartoon or logo can help you brand. Heck, I’ve been using the Zac Johnson toon ever since I launched this blog and it’s worked wonders for my brand. If you haven’t tried using similar branding methods within your own business or marketing, now is a great time to get started. Thanks to the power of advanced web design and UX, you can now animate such images and designs without the need for any video or additional components loading on your site. Don’t forget to throw a call to action into the mix to really convert your audiences’ attention into much more.

Expert Tip:

“Characters help you explain your product or service in just a few seconds in a fun and effective way. This, at the end, will boost your conversions rates up to the sky. The statistics indicate that an engaging marketing video can raise your sales by 20% on average, and up to 60% in some cases!”  – Yum Yum Videos

7 – Persuader Videos

Explainer videos have been a great marketing tool for not only increasing conversions but also for grabbing the attention of your audience and sometimes keeping them watching for several minutes! Discover how you can increase sales and gain trust by using real people in your video. Whiteboard and explainer videos are nice, but sometimes it’s nice to see the real people who are behind the names and brands we are buying from.

8 – Value Based Exit Overlays

Popup windows are nothing new for online marketers, nor the average user on the internet. Sure, some people will find them annoying, but in most cases, they will only appear once. However, what isn’t annoying at all, is how well such marketing methods work and increase sales time and time again. If you currently have an online store or are looking to get someone on your mailing list, exit overlays are simply one of the best ways to do it.

Expert Tip:

“The truth is, regardless of how you feel about popups in general, data shows that exit popups actually do work really well. When you implement an exit-intent popup on your site, you could recover 10-15% of lost visitors.”  – Syed Balkhi

9 – Death of the Homepage

The idea of getting rid of your homepage is probably a nightmare. In this example, it’s more about a devaluation of the homepage and making it more about a personalized and behavioral experience on your site, versus a one-design for all concept. Another great way to accomplish this is by making your main page more like a landing page and giving your audience a choice of different directions they might want to go. If you have the ability to segment and track your audience, this is a must for 2017.

10 – Scrolling Trumps Navigation

If native advertising has taught us anything, it’s that scrolling content works extremely well. After all, when you get to the bottom of a website and there is nothing to do… of course you are going to leave! With all of this in mind, discover how you can start making your site infinitely scroll, while also analyzing how much longer visitors are actually staying on your site.

Expert Tip:

“Website navigation mistakes are expensive and avoidable. One mistake could affect both search rankings user friendliness. Make the labels descriptive. Limit the number of items to seven. Put the important stuff at the beginning. Avoid drop down menus.”  – KissMetrics

Must Implement Web Design Trends in 2017

As you can see, with the coming advancements and changes in site design and UX, it’s quite an exciting time for site owners and brand marketers around the world. The days of static HTML and leaving WordPress site ‘as is’ are coming to an end. Even if you don’t know how to implement such design changes and trends into your own site, it’s well worth the time, cost and effort to hire a professional design to make such customizations for you.