Because of increased adoption of mobile phones, it is important to have a website that is mobile friendly. Many website owners who have a separate mobile website believe they have a mobile-responsive website; however, there is a difference between a mobile website and a mobile-responsive website.
With a mobile responsive website, you only have one website that includes the code to adapt to all screen sizes, regardless of device. On the other hand, mobile website is a separate website that needs to have a second, mobile-only subdomain.
Why Mobile Responsive Design is Important
- Mobile usage is increasing day by day. Surprisingly, there are more smartphones on planet than there are people. The number of people accessing your website from a mobile phone each month will more than likely increase month-to-month.
- Mobile website traffic because the number of smartphones is increasing day by day. Marketpath advises that almost 60% of all website traffic comes from mobile phones.
- The best characteristics of a mobile responsive website from a customer perspective is the seamless experience regardless of the device used. A mobile friendly website will appear the same on a smartphone as it does on a desktop computer. So, this seamless experience can significantly reduce customer frustration.
- Having a separate mobile website was common practice before the creation of mobile responsive websites. Having multiple websites means more website maintenance. A mobile friendly website allows you to have just one website, making website maintenance a much easier task. Also, it keeps your costs much lower.
- Mobile friendly websites are also good for SEO purposes. Google has announced that it favours mobile responsive website design to mobile websites. In simple, having one URL makes it easier for Google bots to crawl a website.
- Google Page Speed Developers recommend that web content above the fold on a mobile phone should load in under one second, and the complete page should load in under two seconds. This is basically impossible when loading an entire desktop website on a mobile device. If a user wait too long for a website to load, he/she will likely leave.
- There are many tools available online to help you test your website’s speed. The best one is Google’s Page Speed Insight tool. This tool will provide you with a score out of 100, along with optimizations you can make to improve your website’s speed.
- The biggest advantages to a mobile friendly website is the fact that the size of the website is designed based on screen size, not the device. This contains devices of the future. As new devices come out, a mobile friendly website will still look beautiful on them.
- As per Google Think Insights, a web user who lands on a mobile website and does not find what they are looking for are 61% more likely to leave immediately and go to another website. On the other hand, if a mobile visitor has a positive experience with your website on a mobile device, they are 67% more likely to buy a product of service.
- You may know that social media use increases website visits. Marketpath advises that 55% of social media use is now done on a mobile device. Sharing links on social media to your website will result in more traffic and viewing of your website from mobile devices. Thus, it is important to provide social media users who click through to your website with a great experience.