We all know that smartphone and tablet use has skyrocketed in the last several years. People are accessing the internet from a myriad of screen sizes and your website needs to keep up with that. This article explores why mobile-friendly websites are important.
What is a mobile-friendly website?
A mobile-friendly website is a website that maintains a smooth user experience on any device. The browser window should respond to any device size. Smartphone users should have no problem accessing your website and interacting with your business.
Here are some tips and considerations when working with your web designer or developing your mobile site:
- Be sure your navigation can easily be accessed from a phone or tablet. Make sure links are spaced far enough apart to handle touch capabilities. On mobile phones, it is difficult to click links that are close together.
- The content of the website should not run off the side of the page. Responsive design ensures that your content fits within the browser window of any device.
- You should not compromise user experience when creating a responsive website design. When working with a website designer, ask them about taking a “mobile first” approach to your website. This means they prioritize the mobile view and then build the desktop or laptop view afterward.
- Avoid any software that is going to hinder the mobile experience. Don’t use programs like Adobe Flash unless it is necessary. Most browsers do not support these features unless they are manually enabled. This can damage the user experience greatly.
- Ensure that your font size is readable on all devices. Mobile users should be able to read the content you have on your website. At Noctem Media, we use a font size of 16px to ensure that all of our content is readable.
Can I benefit from a mobile-friendly website?
Absolutely. Any business can benefit from mobile web design because it improves your rankings in search results and creates a better user experience for your website visitors.
Think about how often you use your phone to find information about a business. The amount of internet users that turn to their mobile devices to do research is increasing drastically. If your website isn’t available for them, you are losing valuable website traffic.
Having a mobile-friendly website design ensures that anyone looking for you can find you from any device. This puts you in a better position to capture leads and increase sales.
Mobile website design is becoming more and more important for businesses like restaurants and retail shops. When people are out and about, they are most likely using their phones to find businesses to go to. You want your website to be available for them to browse at any time.
Here are some of the benefits of a mobile-friendly website:
- Your website will be available for any user on any device, increasing the amount of traffic your website gets.
- Prioritizing mobile responsiveness positively impacts your search engine rankings. As of March 2018, Google has implemented mobile first indexing, meaning they consider your mobile site before your desktop site.
- Your customers will appreciate the ability to easily find information about your business from anywhere.
- Your brand credibility will increase because your competitors are most likely already using a mobile website.
Take these benefits seriously when considering whether or not to invest in a mobile responsive website.
The numbers don’t lie.
According to StatCounter, 51.3% of all internet traffic comes from mobile devices. That is over half of the traffic on the internet. If your website isn’t mobile friendly, you are missing out.
(Line Graph Source: StatCounter)
If you want to keep your customers happy and your search engine rankings high, prioritize your mobile efforts. You will be rewarded in the long run as you see more traffic to your website, higher Google rankings, and more customers engaging with your business.
Most web designers these days ensure that your website works well on mobile devices. That is a major reason why many people are re-designing their websites. Just to be safe, ask your web designer about their mobile-friendly approach to ensure you don’t pay for something that doesn’t help your business.
At Noctem Media, we prioritize mobile friendliness as a way to improve your search rankings and return on investment. Learn more about our website design services and get started on a website that works for your business.
To make your journey to mobile-friendliness easier, Google provides plenty of tools that allow you and your web designer to check the mobile responsiveness of your website. Check out the Google Mobile-Friendly Test. This tool will let you know if your website is mobile friendly and give you guidance on how to improve your website for performance and responsiveness.
Conclusion
A mobile-friendly website is one that maintains a smooth user experience on smaller screens.
You and your web designer can accomplish this by making your website navigation easy to use on mobile, optimizing content to be responsive and look great on all screens, avoiding bulky software that doesn’t perform well on mobile, and keeping content text easy to read on all devices.
Any business can benefit from a website that works on mobile. This will increase customer happiness, boost search rankings, and drive more traffic to your website.
Over half of all website traffic comes from mobile devices and Google frowns upon websites that do not support mobile views. Google provides tools and advice on building and optimizing for mobile.
Noctem Media builds every single website to be mobile responsive and high performing. We believe in building websites that get results for our clients. Learn more about our website design services.
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