It’s 2018, and whether you’re a brand new business building your first website, or an established one in need of a revamp, there are a slew of factors you’ll need to take into account. Consumers and technology have evolved, SEO algorithms have changed, and new digital tools have emerged. Good thing we’ve scoured the net to provide you with the top 24 web design articles of 2018 that will help you not only produce a great website, but capture new customers and grow your business at the same time.
Gabriel Shaoolian from Entrepreneur talks about how to use web design tactics like video landing pages, parallax scrolling, and animated calls to action that will make a concrete impact on business growth.
What are some of the top web design trends for 2018 that your business should be aware of? Bryant Chou from Forbes goes over things like long-form multimedia, content hubs and e-books, and principles-first design.
Technology is always changing, and it takes a lot of effort to keep your website in line with what’s new. Aaron Dicks from The Next Web takes a closer look at some of the most important technical improvements you can make to your website this year like mobile optimization and AMP for ads.
One of the biggest website design optimization mistakes that businesses make is image size. Slow loading times hurts not only the user experience, but SEO and search rankings. Brandon Morelli of Codeburstio goes over how to audit your website for heavy image size, and make the necessary changes.
There’s no telling what device users might access your website on. Whether it’s PC, smartphone, or tablet, your website needs to be responsive to every device, browser and operating system to ensure a seamless experience. TG Daily breaks down everything from typography to grid design on how to make your website responsive.
Landing pages can be one of the most effective tools in targeting your lead generation efforts towards specific customer segments. Here, Hubspot provides a ton of landing page inspiration for 2018. From big brands like Shopify and AirBnb, you’ll learn how to properly execute landing page elements like forms, copy, and layout.
How your design your website can play a pivotal role in how you rank in search engines like Google and Bing. And there’s perhaps no better authority on SEO, SERP, and keyword analysis than Moz. Rand Finshkin breaks down everything you need to know about designing your website to be SEO friendly, taking into account updated ranking algorithm changes.
Product tour pages are especially important for technology companies trying to showcase a product or service to potential buyers. Design Shack breaks down some of the best product tour pages of 2018 from successful brands like Mint.com and Basecamp so that you can apply some of the same principles to your own website.
No matter what business you’re in, having a blog on your website has become virtually mandatory. And one of the most popular, useful, and flexible platforms to build both your website and blog is WordPress. Torque magazine provides some of the best tips for 2018 that will allow you to use WordPress to generate an attractive, user-friendly blog interface.
Nothing builds credibility with future customers better than testimonials from your current ones. Here, Zachary Basner provides a comprehensive guide on how to get some of the best customer testimonial content for your website, and produce it into engaging and informative video format.
For companies involved in business to business sales of products and services, websites have to be designed and optimized for a different audience than consumer focused websites. DBS Interactive provides some of the best examples of B2B web design principles such as functional minimalism, clearly defined value proposition, and CTA placement.
When it comes to website design, it’s easy to get carried away with text, videos, pictures, and other elements that you think the visitor needs to see. Mallen Baker from DaisyWheel explains why you should avoid overstuffing your website with too much content, and how you can accomplish your business goals through a simplistic approach to design.
No matter what business you’re in, one of the main purposes of your website is to get visitors to take some sort of action. These conversions can be anything from downloading an ebook, subscribing to a mailing list, or making an actual purchase. Erin McCoy writes in Forbes about some of the best web design hacks that can increase conversions, no matter what your goals are.
One of the best ways to keep your customers engaged, and attract potential new ones, is creating an online community section of your website. Vanilla Forums is a technology company specializing in building online communities for some of the largest brands, and takes you through why Gamification is set to be one of the biggest community page trends in 2018, and how you can leverage it successfully on your website.
It’s true that the Infographic has been around for quite some time, but it’s still one of the most effective resources you can have on your website to communicate complex concepts in a concise, colorful, and impactful way. But times have changed, and Shutterstock provides an updates how-to on producing infographics that will resonate with today’s digital consumer.
Whether it’s contact us, event registration, or scheduling a demo, your website is likely going to have multiple forms for visitors to fill out on a consistent basis. The problem is, many forms are designed in a way that’s too complicated or not user friendly, often resulting in visitors abandoning the process altogether. Marc Schenker of Adobe offers some easy, but powerful, solutions to creating web forms that are simple and effective for 2018 and beyond.
Depending on your business and budget, you’ll need to sort out how exactly you’re going to design your website, who’s going to do it, and around how much it’s going to cost. 99Designs offers a highly detailed breakdown of what your website design plan needs to include, and the different pricing options typically available. From a freelancer driven project to full-blown agency, you’ll need to browse this guide to make sure your website is delivered not just on time, but on budget as well.
Whether you’re dealing with a freelance designer or an internal team, odds are you’re going to need a website layout mockup to being the design process. Your layout functions as the initial foundation for your design, so the better it is, the easier the whole process will go. Photoshop Tutorials provides an in-depth, step by step guide on creating a professional layout with one of the most powerful graphic design softwares on the market, Adobe Photoshop.
Depending on the size and stage of your business, you may want to employ a free website builder of some kind. Mark Wilson from Tech Radar provides an up to date ranking of free website builders like Joomla and Weebly to help you determine which builder might be right for you. And as your website progresses, you’ll be able to upgrade to more premium versions of these services.
Designing a quality, converting landing page oftentimes isn’t as simple as you might think. Vague messaging, cluttered layouts, and other common mistakes can significantly decrease land page effectiveness, and in turn overall conversions. Venture Harbour lays out seven of the most common landing page pitfalls, and provides ways to avoid or overcome them for 2018.
While copywriting might not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of website design, it really is one of the most important aspects to the overall user experience of your site. Strong copywriting is necessary in multiple aspects of your web design, including headings, CTAs, and forms. Professional web copywriter Lorrie Hartshorn provides a comprehensive list of actionable tips that will help take your web copy to the next level.
Choosing a color scheme for your website might not seem like a huge decision, but it’s one that shouldn’t be taken lightly. Colors have a subtle (yet dramatic) effect on the human psyche, and users will often subconsciously judge the credibility of your website and business based on the color scheme. Thankfully, the pros at Website Builder Expert have provided a comprehensive guide created to help you choose the best color scheme for multiple aspects of your website that will match the expectations of your audience.
There’s no getting around it, at some point in time you’ll need to redesign your website. And if you haven’t done so recently, then 2018 might just be that time. Sheila Kloefkorn (via Forbes) walks you through the planning process of redesigning a website, as well as how to tackle obstacle and disruptions that are bound to occur during the process.
Another great article from Andy Crestodina at Orbit Media, this piece breaks down the nuts and bolts of how to generate leads from virtually every page on your website. Lead generation is one of the primary goals of most any website, so you’ll want to dig into the nitty gritty of how to capture as many leads as possible.
So there you have it, 24 of the best tips, tricks, and advice on designing your website.