Web Development Trends of 2020

The world of web development is always changing. Each year, new trends emerge that touch on innovation and provide an even more immersive experience for your users. Now that we’re well into 2020, we’re starting to see some great web development trends of 2020 that are shaping the digital space and transforming the way that businesses conduct their activities online.

From artificial intelligence to mobile-focused strategy, it’s important to stay on top of these trends to make sure your website is always ready to leverage growth and conversions.

Here are the top web development trends of 2020 your business should leverage for the rest of the year and well into 2021. Many of these trends can easily be implemented with the help of a knowledgeable web development team.

Chatbots

Last year, the world of web development saw the rise in the use of chatbots, and these numbers have only been growing since then. Chatbots are AI-powered automated messaging systems you can implement on your website to interact with your customers instantly, especially when an agent isn’t available at that moment.

Your customers demand answers, no matter what time of the day it is. The traditional business hours don’t really apply online, especially if you operate an ecommerce business. According to statistics, 50% of customers expect an online business to be open 24/7, while 69% of customers prefer chatbots because they provide instant answers. Further, many people prefer to interact with your business online instead of calling.

A chatbot is an effective way to give your customers answers right away to the most common questions, and it’s not super costly to get up and running. When implementing this function, be sure to include an escalate to agent option that can connect them to a real person if they have a very specific question.

Progressive Web Apps

Research for 2020 indicates that more mobile users prefer using a progressive web app (PWA) than a mobile responsive website. A PWA is a website or a page that utilizes APIs to create an app-like experience for users who view your website on their smartphones or tablets. It will make your user feel like they’re using an app, without having to make the effort to download one from the app store and use up storage space on their phone.

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Building a PWA is also a faster and more cost-effective way to give your users a mobile-based experience without building an actual app. You can collect plenty of data this way that helps tailor the experience to increase conversions and overall traffic.

Mobile Focused Design

If you don’t have the budget to build a PWA or mobile app, you need to make sure that your website is mobile responsive and tailored to mobile users. This is a trend that has been stressed for years now, but it’s more relevant than ever in 2020. Here are some current and emerging technologies you can leverage to increase mobile conversions:

Accelerated mobile pages (AMPs): This is a key tool for creating an effective and mobile user-friendly experience in today’s world. Essentially, AMPs use HTML code to help your pages load faster and smoother on mobile than your regular web pages, so mobile users can get that instant gratification they’re already used to. As a bonus, AMPs can help improve your SEO rank because Google tends to favour websites that have quick load times.
Text/SMS Marketing: Email marketing still works, but you can reach your customers faster if you implement a text marketing system. People are always on their phone, so your message can reach them more directly by SMS (especially for those who don’t always use their mobile data for Internet browsing) instead of waiting until they check their email.
Mobile Push Notifications: Another way to leverage your mobile experience is to use push notifications for smartphones. This is a great way to reach those mobile users directly, while allowing them to forgo having to input their credentials in your site (like their email) to get updates on their favourite products.

Voice Search Optimization

More households are using devices like Google Home and Alexa to perform their daily activities, from listening to music to stocking up on household supplies. As these devices become more affordable, this trend has only continued to rise in 2020. Everything is about convenience, and it’s much easier to say, “Hey Google, search for pet supplies” from your couch than it is to open up your phone, open Google, and type in your search query.

Voice search optimization is a little different than your typical SEO strategy because people speak commands differently than they type them. A good web developer can integrate web speech API to work with voice data to give your website a stronger search presence in all areas.

Key Takeaways

No matter which of these web development trends of 2020 you decide to implement for your own business, here are some important points to keep in mind: