2020 Trends in Interactive Web Design
The web is no longer a place for passively scrolling up and down a page. Increasingly, users expect to be pulled in and involved every time they open an email, click an ad, or visit a landing page. Users want seamless, interactive experiences. As a result, brands are always evolving in their quest to create these experiences and engage users.
So, what are some of the biggest trends in interactive web design for 2020? Let’s find out!
Artificial Intelligence
Once reserved for the genre of science fiction, artificial intelligence is now a fact of life for consumers. AI has been a complete game-changer in marketing, leading to higher conversion rates through personalization, automation, and data analysis. And it couldn’t have come sooner.
As the volume of data available to marketers grows exponentially, creative companies are continually finding new ways to integrate AI to free up marketers’ time. Amazon is the vanguard of the AI movement with its ability to find ever-more creative ways of encouraging further purchases. Think about it: when was the last time you received an order email from Amazon and didn’t scroll down to see what similar items customers purchased?
Automation and Personalization
These days, markets are becoming increasingly segmented, and marketers realize that no two customers are truly alike. Gone are the days of casting a wide net through a single mass email and hoping for the best. The single one-size-fits-all marketing campaign is no longer viable.
Enter automation and personalization, which allows companies to personalize their message to a specific audience. One powerful way of doing this is through emails sent out when triggered by user behavior. According to a 2019 MailChimp survey, businesses that send welcome emails to new customers have an order-to-recipient rate nine times higher than that of companies who rely on bulk email.
More than ever, companies are tailoring their message to the individual consumer through product recommendations, abandoned cart messages, and personalized interest emails. Need proof? Look no further than Nintendo, whose emails frequently include recommendations to customers based on past game purchases.
Interactive Email
Users have short attention spans, so it’s essential to make conversion points as accessible as possible. Marketers are waking up to the fact that attention is a precious commodity. Any time users click, leaving the email to go to a web page, companies run the risk of losing the attention of the user.
One way companies are reducing friction is through interactive emails. Users can now swipe, click, or otherwise engage in content-like surveys and interactive games without leaving their inbox. It’s clearly effective: a Martech Advisory study found that interactive email content can improve click-to-open rates by as much as 73 percent! Nike has found success by allowing users to compete for trophies and badges based on their own training regimen. Home Depot and Etsy are also making use of this trend, allowing users to review products within their emails.
Animation and Video
It’s no coincidence that animated GIFs have become such a staple of social media: movement and animations grab users’ attention, help define your brand personality, and add a bit of lightness and fun that text simply doesn’t offer. Plus, one study shows that our brains perceive images more quickly than words. Platforms are making it easy to include GIFs, APNGs, and animated illustrations within emails. Marketers are taking note, making animation one of the biggest rising trends in interactive marketing.
It’s not just animation, though; it’s becoming increasingly easy to add a video to emails, which could be a boon to savvy marketers. Research by Campaign Monitor suggests adding video to an email can increase click rates by 65 percent. If it’s so foolproof, why aren’t more marketers using animation and video? In years past, various email clients made it difficult to open video in an email. That’s changing, and companies are jumping on board and creating more digital video content than ever. Patagonia, for example, captivated its users by adding a video clip of a promotional film called “Force: The Story of Mike Schaefer,” which featured footage showing his climbs in the Patagonia region. An interactive experience like this simply would not have been possible only a few years ago.
Social Media Integration
Social media is everywhere, and it allows companies to generate awareness, engagement, and sales like never before. And it’s proven to be effective: according to a survey by CampaignMonitor.com, small businesses see social media as the most effective way of building brand awareness. Some reports even claim that adding a social share button to an email can increase the click-through rate by 150 percent!
These days, users want a seamless experience. With tools allowing businesses to include social media integration in emails, companies like American Eagle, with their #AExME campaign, are using this approach to increase engagement. In the campaign, American Eagle used social media influencers as spokespeople for their product. Other companies are finding success by embedding live social media feeds in emails. One thing is for sure: social media is here to stay. Smart marketers are leveraging it in new, innovative ways.