1.)  Content Matters

The basis of good design is good content. Outdated blogs are a thing of the past. Use your content to educate or entertain your audience – it boosts credibility.

 

2.) Mobile Responsiveness

If your site is not mobile-friendly you’ve immediately lost points for relevancy with your consumers. The premise of consumers desiring to access your site from a mobile setting is something all businesses should capitalize upon, and make the UX flawless.

 

3.) Social Media Badges

Share all your networks and all of your messages by adding these attractive and easy to use badges to your site. Customers can easily redirect to your various social sites to further their interaction with your business.

 

4.) Infographics

These trendy communication graphics tackle big ideas and break them down into understandable bits of information. Our attention spans are more prone to learn when communication is presented in this way.

 

5.) Infinite Scrolling

Sites like Pinterest make this a nearly addicting feature. Uninterrupted surfing allows for a very smooth experience, and increases the amount of time users spend on your site. It’s like being served breakfast, lunch, and dinner without ever having to leave bed.

 

6.) Animated GIFs

An animated GIF or Graphics Interchange Format file is a graphic image on a Web page that moves, it is the lovechild of photo and video and is a loop of ordered images that is often accompanied with text.

 

7.) Design Simplicity

Large background images, large text and minimalist layouts, it seems that the design trends this year can be summed up with bigger is better and less is more. Bear in mind those two rules and you will have the trendiest website of the year.