Is Web Design Dead?

In the world of web design, things have definitely changed in the past few years. This is primarily because smartphones and tablets have evolved so much. Most consumers (and especially the younger ones) are getting all their information, news, entertainment and social networking on these smaller devices.

Websites used to have more elaborate designs based on strong branding and imagery. Today, those elements take a backseat to mobile responsiveness. A site must work on all different platforms (desktop, laptop, tablet and smartphone) equally or it will not be as effective. The smaller the device is, the more simplified the design needs to be so that all the necessary information is easy to find on your site.

That’s why you see so many designs based on themes. Really, “theme” is a fancy word for “template.” However, in the marketing world, template is a bad word because it cheapens the perception. Today’s web themes are very well-designed and there are many to choose from no matter who your hosting provider is. They are automatically integrated to be mobile responsive. In fact, if you are building your own website using a do-it-yourself hosting service like GoDaddy, Wix, Weebly or WordPress, there are preview tabs that will show you how each page of your site looks on different devices.

So, is web design dead? Not necessarily. It’s still important to highlight your brand and have a cohesive marketing look that flows with the rest of your campaign. At the same time, function now outweighs form. If your site doesn’t present well on all devices and navigation is overly complicated, it will not be as effective. The best branding in the world will fall flat on a poorly presented site.

In addition to mobile responsiveness, today’s sites need content—from SEO tags on the back end to dynamic ongoing content in the form of blogs, calendars, news, social media posts and customer reviews. In other words, adding fresh content to your site on a regular basis will make a huge difference in people being able to find your site through organic searches.

Web design is not dead. It has just evolved along with technology. Branding is still important, but mobile responsiveness and dynamic content are now more important.

To learn more about dynamic web content for your website, contact NextGear Marketing for a free consultation today.