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As a business owner, you may be asking yourself, “Do I need a mobile-friendly website?” While you may think it may be enough to simply have a website, not having a mobile-friendly website can cause you to lose out on sales and revenue. In short, you need a mobile-friendly website if you want to attract and retain customers.
If you’re still on the fence about optimizing your website for mobile, take a look at these mobile marketing statistics that paint a clear picture as to why having a mobile-friendly website is important:
- Users form an opinion about your website in 0.05 seconds that determines whether they like your site or not (or if they’ll stay or leave). (Taylor Francis Online)
- 52% of all website traffic is generated from mobile phones. (Statista)
- 61% of consumers say they are more likely to purchase from mobile-friendly sites. (BrightLocal)
- 85% of adults think that a company’s website when viewed on a mobile device should be as good or better than its desktop website. (Invision)
- 38% of people will stop engaging with a website if the content or layout is unattractive. (HubSpot)
- 39% of people will stop engaging with a website if images won’t load or take too long to load. (HubSpot)
Think about these statistics when you’re questioning whether or not you need a mobile-friendly website. Without one, you run the risk of missing out on the majority of web traffic considering 52% of all website traffic occurs on a mobile device. This means that more than half of your prospective customers will find what they’re looking for elsewhere since they won’t be able to get what they need through your website when searching on their phones.
Limiting yourself by not making sure your website is mobile-responsive can be detrimental to the success of your business.
How to Make Your Website Mobile-Friendly
Now that you’re aware of the importance of a mobile-friendly design, it’s time to learn how to enhance your website. Follow along as we share our recommendations for making your website mobile-friendly.
Use a responsive website design
One of the most important aspects of mobile-friendliness is building your website with a responsive design. This means that your website will look its best on both desktop and mobile, and will adjust proportionally as the screen size changes — no matter the device the user is viewing your website from. The appearance and layout of your website will optimize accordingly based on the specific screen size on the device being used. This enables you to provide the same information to both desktop and mobile users, ensuring they receive the information in a way that is best for them.
Make your content accessible
When prospective customers land on your website they want to be able to find what they’re looking for quickly and efficiently. They typically want the answer to a specific question or contact information to purchase your product or schedule an appointment. Ask yourself what your prospective customers will be looking for when they first land on your website. Use this exercise to determine if customers will be able to answer these questions quickly via your website, or if it will require them to dig a bit deeper into the site. The more accessible you make this website content, the more likely the user is to stay on your website and convert them into a lead or sale.
Avoid having ads and popups
There are few things more frustrating than trying to read a website from your phone only to have a giant popup open and block the entire screen—especially if there is more than one that keeps opening. Not only does this create a very frustrating user experience for customers accessing your website on their phone, but can cause them to leave your website altogether and visit a competitor’s website instead. Instead, opt-out of having text-blocking ads or popups on your website, especially on the mobile version of your site.
Improve your site speed
Have you ever visited a website on your phone that took far too long to load? Whether the text or the images wouldn’t load, you probably remember exactly how frustrating it was. Nowadays users will form an opinion on your website in 0.05 seconds. If your website isn’t loading fast enough for them, they’re likely to leave your website and find a faster, more mobile-friendly website instead.
Opt for a simple website design
You may want your website to have all the bells and whistles, but an overly complex website design can actually do more harm than good. The simpler the design, the better it will look on the screen of a smaller device. A simple, minimalist design also means that your website is likely to experience faster load times since it won’t be bogged down by large images or graphics.
Adjust the font size
The screen of a mobile device is much smaller than the screen of a desktop computer. If the font size on your website isn’t optimized for mobile, you may be making it difficult for prospective customers to reach all of the important information on your website. Consider enlarging the font on mobile or making it possible for the user to adjust the mobile website’s font size for added convenience.
Allows users to switch to desktop view
To prevent users from having trouble viewing your website on a variety of devices, you should always make it easy for them to switch back and forth between mobile view and desktop view. This will allow them to see the full website if their device isn’t correctly displaying the mobile version of the website. It’s also a great option for users who are accessing your website through a tablet.
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Add search functionality
Even well-designed mobile website navigation can be confusing and a bit cluttered, especially if the user has something very specific they’re looking for on your website. Instead of forcing them to click through multiple menu options to find the answer to their question, include a search function that is easily accessible so prospective customers can search specific products or services and cut back the number of clicks they need to make.
Optimize images for mobile
If your website utilizes a lot of imagery, it’s incredibly important that you optimize the image size to prevent large images from slowing for your website. The smaller the image file, the more quickly the image will load. When adding images to your website, you should upload them in the smallest size possible without diminishing the overall quality of the image. Although the images may load quickly on a desktop, a mobile device has a much smaller bandwidth which can cause the images to take more time to load.