According to a recent article appearing on the Forbes website there are 9 key trends to look out for in web design during 2016.

As the article points out, the web design industry is always evolving and things that companies were doing just 6 months ago might not be as relevant as they are now, and things that only some were doing must be done now to ensure good SEO practise – like the recently imposed responsive design algorithm that means mobile responsive sites are ranked better within the search engines than non-mobile responsive sites are. Here we will build on what Forbes have said and give you an insight as to why designers are choosing these trends.

The 9 trends that are apparently featuring high this year in web design are:

1. Hero images
2. Material Design
3. Typography
4. Background videos and animations
5. Hover animations
6. Scrolling
7. Motion animations
8. Fullscreen forms
9. Duotone colour schemes

As you can see animations are massive right now, with a lot of different types popping up in the trends for 2016. The key to animations on any web page though is to enhance it, rather than distract the user. They have to be used correctly and background animations or videos can do well to have a gentle movement of an entire image which will not distract from the main content. Hover animations have become trend as designers and developers have found that users tend to hover over elements of a site when they are unsure of the elements function; therefore they allow for instant feedback for the user. The main problem with hover animations though is the fact that it isn’t very responsive and there have to be changes made for when the site is accessed on a touch screen device. Motion animations can be used to direct a users eye to something specific on a page and are often used to highlight offers on ecommerce sites and breaking news stories on news sites; but have got uses elsewhere too.

Hero images are not a modern thing at all and have been used in many web design realms for years. However they are growing in popularity. The hero image is a striking image that attracts the eye of the user and usually features a call to action. The pro of them these days is the fact that the advances in bandwith and data compression has meant they don’t have as much of an effect on the loading time of the page. Similarly modern trends have used these advances to draw the eye of a user with the typography of a page. The streamlined design of modern sites allows for bold and dramatic font which will have a strong impact, and this years trends seem to be artistic, calligraphic fonts as they tend to to give a more personal touch to a site while really catching the eye.

The flat, responsive design craze has really hit its heights and googles material design style language is the next dimension to that. It gives more depth to flat designs and incoprates grid style layouts and responsive animations with light and shadows. Scrolling web pages are also a major thing due to their ability to fit in to the mobile responsive template so well and many sites are using scrolling rather than pages to put their content out there. Another element to come out of responsive design is fullscreen forms; these allow for legible space, which is easy to interact with, and puts focus on an individual screen while they input data. Finally duotone colour schemes are a major hit this year apparently due to the striking visual impact they can have on a user, while also not using much of the space on the screen; allowing them to be prominent on mobile screens as well as  desktops.

You can request any type of site from your web designer. There are custom built sites that a designer can build from scratch or there are content management systems (CMS) like wordpress, magento, squarespace and wix that a web designer can build using templates. Each CMS site is different and some work better than others for e-commerce sites but a web designer will be able to tell you which will suit your business.

There are pros and cons of using CMS sites for your websites, but there are also major pros of a company building you a custom made site too, so you have to think about what you want out of your website.

If you want complete control over your site once its live then a CMS might seem like the best idea. They are designed to be simple and easy to use so even the biggest technophobe will have no problems running the site after the web designer hands it over. The CMS sites available are usually built using a theme/template which can be customised and can feature plugins for features that aren’t as standard.

The content of your site will be easy to update and change on a regular basis with a CMS, and you can assign people different as users on the system so each section is run by the appropriate person.

The cons of CMS sites though are that they are limited to what is available on them at any time. So a plugin that is helping your site work well could stop being updated and eventually stop working with the updates on your site. You have to work with what is available for the site and some features you really want may be very difficult to implement. Also once a template has been found and the site laid out, it can be quite difficult to change anything like that.

A custom built site will allow you to be very specific to your needs. If you don’t need to have control of the site once its live, or if it is a site that will pretty much run itself, then a custom build site will be perfect.

The major benefit of a custom built site though is the loading time. CMS sites with plugins – which are what will be needed to generate the non-generic features of your site – take a while to load when people first visit them, which is likely to increase your bounce rate. A custom site wont have this problem and may help keep people visiting for longer. A custom built site is also more secure when it comes to storing personal information, so if you need an e-commerce site then you might be best going custom built for security reasons.

Of course the problem with custom sites is that there will be a lot of technical upkeep to do that you may not be able to do yourself, meaning you might have to employ someone specially to maintain the site or keep your chosen web design company company on for longer in order for them to update everything for you.

One of the most common requests web designers get these days is actually the best of both worlds. Its the request to create a custom made site as a theme and install it onto wordpress with the custom built plugins etc they have had to build for you. This allows them to get the website they want and be able to add and amend the content on it frequently.

Getting a website designed for your business can be an easy task if you know where to go. There a number of reputable web design companies out there and freelancers willing to give the job a go at a reasonable price. However what you want to make sure you do is consider your content before hiring your chosen company or individual.

Some companies will require you to provide your own content, which is great sometimes because you might just have a passion for words. However you may not and if you don’t you are going to struggle to really get the words down on paper that you want your customers to read. Even people who are really great with grammar and getting their point across may struggle with the content for a website because website writing is quite a difficult task when there are keywords and other things to consider.

The best web design companies will be able to provide guidance to you when writing your own content, or provide someone to do the content for you, with some input from yourself of course. This is the best solution otherwise you may find yourself paying for an outsourced copywriter to write your website content, costing you even more money.

The things you have to consider when writing content for your site is the length of content and the originality of the content. If your site is content rich and very specific to your business then you should be ok but thin content is penalised by search engines, especially if it is automatically generated or sourced from other places on the web.

So if you have ready made content from your existing site, are happy to write the content yourself or know someone who knows what they are doing then using web designers who don’t deal with content is fine. However if you need guidance or someone to do new content for your site make sure you source the right company for the job.

SEO is also known as Search Engine Optimisation, this is the organic ranking of your site. Getting your site to number is another thing that we specialise in. We love making sure that everything on both ends is done to its needs. As a company we specialise in making sure that you reach at least page 1 for your keywords and with a bit of luck and experience position 1. We are very good at what we do, making sure that we have spamless effective links Pioneersist is one of the best Web Agencies out there.

There are some very talented SEO companies in Lancashire but there isn’t that many that really stand out if you think about it. You try and name five current SEO Agencies nearby to you, its harder than you think. But if it was anything else then it would probably be alot easier wouldnt it? I speak about SEO day in, day out. Not many people know exactly what it is, and if they do then they’re over the age of 30. It is a good job to get into as there are so many different types of opportunities to earn money online quick. Not many people really try Affiliate Marketing, this is a shame as it can be very good to get into and use. Our staff at branch do a lot of Affiliate marketing and make quite a lot from it in there spare time. Check out this Affiliate Marketing Blog i found, it has lots of information in it regarding making money through affiliate marketing.

Everyone is now looking for the new and exclusive design with in the Web World. People are now understanding at actually how important internet marketing is for their company. Without it businesses wouldn’t make as much money. It is weird because everything is done on the internet now people hardly have to even move to have their shopping done for them, they can get everything from their sofa and brought to the door, all they have to do is put it away! The internet is a crazy place and it is exciting and thats why right now at Pioneersist we assist you with everything you need.