IS YOUR WEBSITE MOBILE FRIENDLY?
If the answer is, “No” or “I’m not sure,” this article is for you
Grab your smartphone right now and go to your company’s website. Is there a lot of text? Do you have to pinch or zoom in to read it? If so, your users may get frustrated and go elsewhere.
The desktop version of a website is often difficult to view and use on a mobile device. Given the fact that many of your users are likely to visit your website on a smartphone or tablet at least some of the time, it’s important for them to have a positive experience when they get there.
Mobile-Friendly Features
What makes a website a mobile-friendly one? Generally speaking, it’s designed with features including:
- Larger text of an easily readable size on a small screen
- Mobile-friendly navigation which quickly displays the most relevant content
- Touch-friendly buttons and page elements, placed far enough apart to be easily tapped
- Faster download speed
- Avoidance of software (like Flash) not typically available on mobile devices
Benefits for Your Company
In addition to improving the user experience, having a mobile-friendly website can provide your company with other valuable benefits. Topping this list is improved search visibility, meaning your company may appear higher up on the list when prospects search for the products/services you offer. This is because Google uses mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal and favors these types of websites in its search rankings.
Having a mobile-friendly website can also help your company stand out from the competition. There are still many businesses, particularly small ones, which have websites that are not yet optimized for mobile. This could provide your company a good opportunity to enhance its reputation as being concerned with the customer experience.
Tips for Getting Started
Are you ready to plan your new mobile-friendly website? The two most common approaches are to either design a separate website optimized for handheld devices, or to develop your main website so that it utilizes responsive design that scales to any screen size. While there may be cases where a separate mobile website makes sense, responsive design has increasingly become the modern standard since it provides the improved efficiency of maintaining a single website.
