Our Blog

Web Development Trends You Should Know in 2019

In business, it’s important to stay on top of trends both online and offline.

Knowing the latest web development trends is a must for people who do business online. Some of them can do wonders for your conversion and help you gain an edge over your competition.

Adapting these trends can also improve your website’s user experience.

In this post, we’re going to break down three of the latest web development trends. They’ll most likely take over 2019 and knowing about them could give you a much-needed leg up.

Let’s get started.

Progressive Web Apps

You know what a website is. You know what mobile apps are. Progressive Web Apps combine the two, creating a better experience for users.

Websites vs Mobile Apps

Websites are composed of web pages that usually revolve around a specific topic or function. To access them, a user would have to type a URL in a browser whether they’re using a desktop or mobile device.

A mobile app is also built to perform a specific function. Users need to download and install it on their mobile devices.

Afterwards, they can access it even if they’re offline. Even after users close an app, it can send them notifications, reminding them to use it again. Some consider this to be an important advantage over websites.

What About Progressive Web Apps?

A Progressive Web App gives you the best of both worlds.

You can access it using a URL or you can install it on your mobile device. The choice is up to you. Like a mobile app, you can also download it and continue using it when you’re offline.

As if that weren’t enough, Progressive Web Apps load extra fast. They adapt to any device used to view them without more tweaking on your end.

In a nutshell, Progressive Web Apps allows users to customise their interaction. Users can access it through a URL or an app, and they decide whether they receive notifications or not.

If you’re looking for a Progressive Web App, Forbes is an excellent example. The business magazine created a Progressive Web App where they post niche articles.

Since they switched from a standard website to a Progressive Web App, their load time is faster. Users also remember to return to the website due to notifications. This has resulted in better engagement which could only mean more revenue for Forbes.

How a Progressive Web App Can Benefit Your Business

It lets users continue browsing offline.

If you’re selling products or services online, this is a huge benefit. Even offline, users can continue scrolling through your product pages and learning more about your business.

According to a recent survey, 52% of consumers say that ease of browsing affects which website they’ll do business with. Letting users access your website offline is one major way you can make browsing easier for them.

It saves you money.

Let’s say you have a type of business where developing a mobile app could be beneficial. If you want to let your customers book appointments in advance, a mobile app could streamline the whole process.

If you’re still thinking of developing a mobile app, you might consider going with a Progressive Web App instead. Developing a Progressive Web App instead of a mobile app costs less and could be more beneficial.

Single Page Applications

Single Page Applications change the content of a web page instead of redirecting users to another web page.

If you’ve been online for a while, there’s a huge chance you’ve used a Single Page Application at least once.

Google Mail is an excellent example. If you’re using the recent version, it doesn’t redirect you to a new web page every time you open a new email. The header and sidebar remain the same. You can continue reading and sending emails without going to a new web page.

Since they only reload a specific section of a page, Single Page Applications are faster.

For example, a standard website would need to send and receive every element of a page. A Single Page Application would only need to receive select elements, making the whole transaction quicker.

Disadvantages of Single Page Applications

It doesn’t help your SEO.

To get found online, Search Engine Optimisation needs to be a major part of your digital marketing strategy.

From a web developer’s perspective, Single Page Applications are ideal. They allow you to achieve so much more in fewer lines of code, making the process more efficient.

Single Page Applications and SEO are a different matter.

The more content your website has, the more chances you have to rank for your target keywords. Having a lot of pages lets you use your target keywords several times in the page titles, website content and meta descriptions.

Based on your navigation bar and other links, Google can tell which of your web pages are more important. This knowledge helps them prioritise which web pages they should index first.

Needless to say, a Single Page Application doesn’t make it easy for Google to do that.

If you’re a fan of Single Page Applications, don’t be discouraged by this information. This web development trend doesn’t appear to be going away anytime soon. You can rest assured that if this trend continues to spread, Google will find a way to adapt.

It makes tracking traffic and engagement difficult.

When doing business online, tracking and analyzing website engagement is vital.

This step lets you track which pages resonate the most with your website visitors which can help increase your conversion rate. You can also tell which pages need more improvement in terms of usability, visuals or copy.

Let’s say that you sell men’s clothing, and you have several product pages on your website. One of your product pages for a winter coat is getting a lot of hits and converting a lot of visitors into customers.

Another page is also getting the same amount of hits, but it’s not converting as much. The data can tell you the product page is in dire need of improvement. Maybe you need to change the images for the product or rewrite the copy.

At the moment, a lot of users seem to be experiencing issues with Single Page Applications and Google Analytics. Whenever they try to install Google Analytics, it only registers traffic on the first page.

Some developers have found a workaround for this issue, but it’s quite difficult to implement for non-experts.

Blockchain Technology

If you’ve been online in the last couple of years, you’ve most likely heard of blockchain technology. People have told stories of earning and losing millions through it, but what is it?

Is it something that could impact your business in the long run?

What is Blockchain Technology?

Let’s define what blockchain technology is in the simplest of terms. With online banking, one person can send money to another through bank accounts. The bank, of course, is necessary to complete this process.

Blockchain technology removes banks and other middlemen from the equation. You can send bitcoin, the digital currency commonly associated with it, from your digital wallet to another person.

Transactions are conducted in the form of blocks. The first block is known as the genesis block. Each block contains data about the amount, the sender and the receiver. A hash is associated with a block and is often a set of numbers and letters that function as a block’s ID.

A block also includes the previous block’s hash or ID. This ensures all the blocks in a transaction are linked together. If you tamper with a block, its hash changes. This breaks all its links to the blocks that come before and after it, ensuring your transaction’s security.

Blockchain Technology and Your Business

Blockchain technology can do wonders for your business.

First of all, it can help you save money. When receiving payments from customers, you no longer need to go through banks or credit card companies. You can deal with customers directly, saving on bank and credit card transaction fees.

Blockchain technology can also make your business processes more efficient. It lets several users access a file at the same time, tracking and letting you see changes real-time. This can help with shipping, contracts and other transactions.

Before you get involved with blockchain technology, we recommend doing the required legwork. Do your research. Find out as much as you can about it and if it’s the right path for your business.

Conclusion

You never know which trends will come and ago and which ones will last, especially in the digital space.

That’s why it’s of the utmost importance to stay abreast of them and to decide which ones can help you meet your business goals.

Progressive Web Apps bridge the gap between websites and mobile apps. It serves as a happy medium between the two, letting you access websites offline without having to install anything.

Single Page Applications make accessing information faster for users. They can get the necessary data without having to reload the entire web page. It’s an excellent choice from a user-friendly perspective but may cause issues with your SEO strategy.

Blockchain Technology is a trend that’s sweeping across the globe. After you do your research and decide to use it, it can change the way you do business–how you send and receive payments, how you conduct administrative tasks and so much more.

Before deciding to hop in on these trends, it’s important to do your homework. Read up on Progressive Web Apps, Single Page Applications and Blockchain Technology. Determine if they can help get one step closer to reaching your goals.

Cornerstone Digital is a web development company in Sydney. If you’d like to update your website this 2019, we’d be glad to help. Call us on (02) 8211 0668 or email us at info@cornerstone-digital.com.au.

• Comments (0)
• Trackbacks (0)
• Permalink

Michael Lam

Co-founder of Cornerstone and web junkie, Michael knows just how to diagnose your online problems and remedy the issue. An online enthusiast who believes in technology as an enabler of growth, Michael worries about all the details so you don't have to.