Six years ago was the heyday for custom web design, and to have a custom site then was to be on top of the digital hill. The Internet has obviously evolved a great deal since, with the advent of mobile devices of all sizes and width, the custom web design, not design, has died. To simply mention anything about templates six years ago would bring dirty looks from clients that wanted their site custom. They wanted a custom site, but why? Because they believed that is what their customers wanted. It also allowed them to become web designers, which in most cases, isn’t a great idea. Templates back then looked like, well, um, templates.
Today, sites like Themeforest and Template Monster provide a great choice for wonderful looking modern themes that are responsive, have great functionality, already built, and is quicker for a web company to launch, though they do have some room for improvement in the industry-specific needs of themes. Web design patterns themselves have reached a sort of maturity, due partially to the fact for a few years now, the web is full of useful user interface components. This is a win for users who will now find consistency on the web.
Your Visitors Don’t Care How Attractive Your Site Is The average user visiting your site doesn’t care if it is a custom or template site; all they see is it being good or bad. They are visiting you because of your content or the services you offer.
A 2011 Hubspot survey found 76% of users said that the most important factor in the design of a website was that “The website makes it easy for me to find what I want.” Only 10% of users said, “beautiful appearance” was the most important thing to them.
Most of the content on the web is developed in frameworks like WordPress, which allows the web developer to focus less on design of the site and more time on design of the content i.e. branding and user experience.
Web Designer Transform to UX Designer
The good news is that a designer’s role is now more important than ever. User experience design is growing faster than ever.
Web pages have now become only part of something much larger. Your online presence has grown to more than just that custom site; it is now mobile apps, infographics, social media, and videos. All of these elements need to be planned, designed, and managed. The designers that will thrive are the ones who can manage content across multiple channels. In this new age, the user will welcome this. In a world of brain dump overload, the user screams for a simple, clean, intuitive environment of information they can tap into.
Best,
Rick
