There are some trends that are common of course, but they are changing constantly and evolving. Sometimes it just takes one Steve Jobs to say “Flash is a technology of the past” to turn some heads around. Unfortunately for the industry, sometimes it’s easy to shape the minds of potential customers. And that might lead to them leaving the site without ever clicking “contact us”. So what are they looking at ?
Attention to detail
Is the site validating? Sure it can look great and not validate because frankly W3C validation is a bit of a thing of the past. But that is not exactly the point. The point is that if the website doesn’t validate it might mean the agency is doing stuff quickly and without attention. Because if they don’t care about the quality of their own website, how can they provide quality for a client? Good thing is that the companies I’ve worked at so far all had valid webpages, but it’s pretty common in the business not to care about details like that. Also little things that are “not exactly right” with the site, such as overcompressed graphics, or broken links. That might all turn people’s attention away. Because remember – nobody really READS your website. They SCAN it, and even though they won’t remember your catchy slogan, they’ll remember if they click on something and it won’t be there.
A good balance between eye-candy and simplicity
Especially now the clients begin to realize that there’s a whole science called “web usability” and they know it’s important for the site not only to look good, but to be useable as well. So overcomplicated menus, links that are hard to find inside text and other. Anything that will make their experience at your site less fluid by wondering will make them wander. Away that is.
A versatile portfolio
That is of course a pretty obvious thing, but it’s best to show both typical, clean commercial projects as well as more graphically intense visual stunners. The wider the range the better.
Personal projects
Now more than ever companies need at least one “personal” project to stand out. Because if you do just the stuff your clients tell you to, you’re just boring and you don’t really expand the internet in any way. You just make fillings. So it’s best to have at least one personal project, be it a site or a blog, but not about what’s going on at your company – nobody cares about that. Do something others will find useful. Or do something creative. Because it’s all about being creative in the long run. And right now the decision making on the clients side is by the people in their thirties, who are really, really open-minded (or can be). So it wont hurt to show them you are too.
Social media only if you have an idea for it
Being on facebook for the sake of it is useless. Or having an empty page with 10 fans. People will notice and will know that your social media skills are close to none. And that will steer them away from you too.
Also claiming to do social media campaigns without having a successful one of your own before can result in a lot of dissatisfaction and the AIDAS will be lacking the S. And the A probably too.
So go out there, be creative. The more competition we have the better the industry becomes. Let’s not let it get stagnant and let’s all run with the web, as it’s gaining momentum constantly.