By Rahul Yadev

Creative web design has gained a lot of traction over the years due to the increasing importance of having any type of website attract as many clicks as possible, and making people stay on a website by utilising imagery that’s visually pleasing to the eyes. If your web design is on point, then it’s pretty obvious that more people will click on and stay on your sight for longer periods of time. The following article will look at six elements of web design to consider if you are looking to build a website.

However, this is easier said than done. Frankly, creative web design is quite a challenge to overcome, and an individual or group that’s not well-versed with these practices might need to employ the appropriate web design and development services to truly take full advantage of the following web design trends of 2017.

1.       Video/GIF backgrounds: While adding pictures on your home page is a pretty neat idea, a better visual medium in order to greet the people who visit your website would be in the form of a high-quality looping video or GIF. After all, moving pictures capture a person’s attention more than a still one, and the first goal of creative web design is to captivate people who click on the website for as long as possible. You can do this seamlessly with Wix Video, they allow you to create your own video channel which you can connect up to your website through YouTube, Vimeo & Facebook. Quality isn’t an issue as the video content is streamed to the highest quality, this even works with live video, and best of all, you can record and collate stats on engagement to learn about which content is engaging the most and which isn’t to make sure you can tweak content and make sure that the content you produce is always tailored to your audience which let’s face it, is the first rule of producing content on a website.

2.       Mobile-first web design: Smartphones have become one of the most widely-adopted forms of technology in the modern world, and a large amount of internet traffic comes through phones. Most web design and development services also make the website in question mobile-friendly as well so these users aren’t alienated.

3.       Utilizing 360^o Videos: Nowadays, 360^o videos have become increasingly prominent in various outlets, with perhaps the biggest exposure being social media sites. It’s become quite apparent that 360^o videos will quickly become a prominent way of showcasing just how far video technology has come, and an individual or group running a website should employ web design and development services that can utilise this technology effectively. Of course if you are new to building websites, you can make use of a feature Wix allow you to incorporate into your website with 360 images. This allows you to engage users that visits your website. Wix offer this feature for free, so whether you are selling merchandise, showing off beautiful landscapes, you can make your pics look as impressive as ever.

4.       Modular (grid-based) design: This design style is also known as the cards/tile-based design approach, and while this trend might not exactly be new the fact of the matter is it has slowly gained a lot of traction, to the point where it’s one of the most effective design trends of 2017. Its overall look is smooth and neat, which is always a huge bonus when one wants to facilitate creative web design.

5.       Virtual Reality (VR): VR technology might be fairly new, but there’s no doubt that this small step into the realm of augmented reality will soon become a mainstay in our society. While its impact in 2017 has been fairly low-key, there’s no question that VR is quickly becoming one of the fastest developing technologies right now, and websites should keep the applications of this technology in mind while utilizing web design and development services.

6.       AI-augmented technology: Artificial Intelligence is taking huge leaps and bounds, and 2017 has showcased the power of this particular technology. Certain websites can take advantage of this technology through the ingenious usage of AI-controlled chatbots, webpages, and whatnot.

This is just a simple guide to get you started as a guide to what users are demanding from websites in 2017. User experience and mobile first design are at the top of every website users wish list and if you cannot offer this with your website, people will simply bounce from your website and go somewhere else. 2017 really is the year where mobile internet browsing will overtake that of desktop, and Google have already announced that they will roll out mobile first indexing of it’s search engine results at the back end of this year so you better get ready for it now.

If you are looking to get started with this stuff on the move, you can easily create your brand new website using the Wix mobile app. This is particularly important if you have any e-commerce element to your website. The Wix mobile app allows you to receive real-time updates and manage your online store at the click of a button, so you have no excuses. Get creating a great looking easy to use website now and get your content in front of the people that matter. Have fun and enjoy!

Author bio: I like to stay updated with popular trends in the field of website design services and their applications in business, technology, entrepreneurship and blogger.