First up I didn’t write this article, it originates from Forrester Research – a US research company.
I found it interesting and maybe others will, with regards to how design features change quite quickly and evolve into good practice.
Ken
| Parameter | 2013 | 2014 |
| Width | Average width in 2013 of 877 pixels | Average width of expanded to 1100 pixels (ranging between 922-1424px) |
| Logo | 93% of fortune 500 companies had their logos in the top left corner | 83.67% of fortune 500 companies had their logos in the top left corner, while rest in the centre of the screen |
| Tagline | 27% of logos include a tagline or a slogan | By 2014, 34.69% of logos include a tagline or a slogan |
| Background | 80% of websites use a primarily light background and colour scheme | 91.84% of websites use a primarily light background and colour scheme |
| Search Box | 87% of websites have a search field | 83.67% of websites have a search field |
| Call To Action | 47% of websites have a clear call-to-action button that takes users three seconds or less to see | 42.86% of websites have a clear call-to-action button that takes users three seconds or less to see |
| Blog / News | 60% of companies feature the latest news and blog posts on their homepage | 75.51% of companies feature the latest news and blog posts on their homepage |
| Contact Info | Contact info was hard to find on 63% of Fortune-500 Companies | Contact info was easy to find on 71.43% of Fortune-500 Companies |
| Newsletter | More that 80% of companies don’t have a newsletter sign-up feature on their homepage. | More that 91.84% of companies don’t have a newsletter sign-up feature on their homepage. |
| Social Media | Only 11% of companies have social media links above the fold and 89% below. | Only 12.24% of companies have social media links above the fold and 46.94% below, whereas 40.82% sites do not have links at all. |
| Content above the fold | 63% | 87.76% |
| Feature a scrolling content window of some kind | 50% | 61.22% |
| Use Favicon icons | 70% | 77.55% |
| Websites aren’t responsive | – | 65.31% |
| Average loading time | Size of Homepage | 6.5 sec. | 766kb | 6.34 sec. | 1.6MB |
| Centered-approach navigation | 93% | 95.92% |
| Use high quality images | 63% | 44.9% |