Undoubtedly, web design trends are always changing, always improving. Web design itself is subjective, but it tends to have one goal – to offer the consumers a user-friendly and seamless experience and provide them with a website that is easy and fast to navigate.
Online banking has been standing on its ground for years. However, with the Covid-19 pandemic, its usage has increased to an all high. For that reason, it has to be at least at par with the in-person banking services as ideally, digital service aims to offer an even better experience than a human can offer.
Generally, unlike other industries, banks follow relatively safe, tested, and proven web design trends. However, since the start of COVID-19, there has been a steep incline of financial institutions trying to modernize and make their websites more accessible, intuitive, and human-like than ever.
The 7 Bank Web Design Trends that seem to drive this post-pandemic strategy are as follows:
Whitespace
Whitespace is not lost space, on the contrary, it is one of the most effective strategies to attract and help lead the user’s attention. Bank websites with a lot of clutter tend to distract the customers. As a comparison, in a bank, the counters are distinguished based on the different services that are offered. When you go physically to the bank, you don’t wander around, but rather follow the signs that lead you directly to the counter that is offering the service you require. Hence, the whitespace resembles those pointers and signs.
All-present login
As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, customers are increasingly using online banking. Therefore, they are willing to explore and check all the services that are available to them from the comfort of their own home, and they check internal pages more than ever. By having the CTA to register/login on every internal page, you constantly remind them of how easy and accessible it is to do your banking services with them.
Colorful Statements
There is no better way to highlight the importance of information on your website and to engage with customers than to add a color (a third color, a bold color) to it. While whitespace guides and leads the customers, the color shows the exact information that your customers are looking for. It stimulates them visually, and they are more likely to look, scroll, click or take any other action on your website.
Consultative Experience
Due to the fact that with online banking the only touchpoint that customers have with the bank is the website, its purpose is also to serve as a consultant. In a bank, if you need to have a professional to help you, you can simply ask for one. However, with online banking, the web design needs to be that good, all-inclusive, informative, educative, intuitive, and human-like that it serves as your consultant. Therefore, to assure a seamless experience for your customer and reduce the chance of them leaving the website because they couldn’t find what they were looking for, think of the questions that your regular customer would ask and gradually answer them on your internal pages in a focused and human-like manner.
Don’t oversell
Yes, information needs to be present, visible, and highlighted on your webpage, but this needs to be done in a concise manner. If you just put information out there so as to attract your whole target audience you get the risk of losing them. When you go to your local branch and just want to pay your bills, the representative doesn’t start offering you car loans out of nowhere. Similarly, your website shouldn’t oversell your services and bombard customers with irrelevant information. Remember, quality over quantity.
Use Alerts
We’ve already talked about the importance of whitespace and highlighted information with color. But, nothing grants customer’s attention better than alert and yet only 40% of credit union websites have alert banners. If you have information that is critical for your target audience, let them know clearly about it by using this eye-catching technique. This is specifically important if you notice that the customer is inactive on the webpage or planning on leaving.
Modern (minimal) design
Bank websites used to be very traditional and old-fashioned. However, with the wave of minimalism, they too, have started changing and redesigning their websites with modern and minimalist designs. Pictures are oftentimes exchanged with minimalist icons, mainly made of just an outline (e.g outline of a phone, an atm, a credit card). The icons are shown to be excellent in guiding the customers and catching their attention rather than confusing, overwhelming, and visually over-stimulating the target audience.
Ultimately, as times are changing we are obliged to adapt to the new normal and embrace all positive alternatives to the old ways of doing things. Especially in the online world, banks need to follow the trends that the pandemic or other circumstances impose and apply them to the website, particularly from the web design aspect. We are here to provide help and guidance in every aspect of the website design for banks, so don’t hesitate to contact us.
