It is probably no surprise that the use of mobile internet has skyrocketed over the last few years. We know that Google searches on mobile devices have passed searches on computers for the first time! Even with this compelling evidence, the vast majority of business websites are still not mobile-friendly. This not only causes headaches for users, but also a loss of business opportunity for the company.
In this post we’ll explain why having a responsive website is just as crucial to your marketing as it is a few important considerations to keep in mind when designing a responsive website.
What is the difference between a mobile design and a responsive design?
There are two main methods for creating mobile sites: responsive design and mobile models.
Responsive design requires that you have only one site that is coded to fit all screen sizes, no matter what device the site is displaying on.
In contrast, a mobile model is a completely separate entity that requires you to have a mobile-only site, often using a subdomain (m.facebook.com). Mobile templates are built for each specific site, not by screen size. This can cause some problems, as we will see below.
Responsive design – a term originally coined by Ethan Marcotte in an A List Apart article in 2010 – has been the most popular and widely used method for mobile devices.
Here are some of the undeniable reasons to prove that your site needs to be responsive:
1) The use of mobile devices is increasing.
This is not surprising to most of you, but despite the impressive statistics below, many businesses still do not have a mobile site. We hope that reading these statistics from various sources will awaken you to the need for a mobile site.
By 2015, more than half of Google searches were conducted on a mobile device.
In Brazil, 56% of Internet users access the internet using a mobile device (e-Marketer)
61% of people have a better opinion of brands when they offer a good mobile experience.
2) Positive experience for the user is a must.
According to Gooogle’s Think Insights for mobile, if a user’s access to their mobile site is frustrated, or if they do not find what they are looking for, there is a 61% chance they will leave immediately by going to another website (most likely a competitor).
3) Blogging and social activities bring mobile visitors.
If you’re like most inbound marketers and have blogging and social media elements embedded in your strategy, you’ve probably seen the rise in mobile traffic. A recent e-Marketer study cites that 93% of mobile device users in Brazil use social media with their mobile device.
If you are sharing content links or links to your site and do not have a mobile-friendly site, you will not only experience high bounce rates and low conversion rates, but also a frustrated audience.
4) Responsive design is best for SEO.
We officially know that Google prefers web designs responsive to mobile standards. Having a single URL makes it easier for Google to crawl your site as well as reduces the chance of SEO errors on the page. For these reasons, responsive sites often perform better and are easier to maintain than a separate mobile site template.
5) A fast responsive website is critical.
According to the developers of Google PageSpeed, the standards recommend that content above the fold on a mobile device should load in less than 1 second, and the entire page will load in less than 2 seconds. This is usually not possible when loading a desktop site on a mobile device. When a user has to wait a long time for a page to load, there is an extremely high chance that they will leave your site behind.
Are you curious to know the performance of your current site on a mobile device? Google developers have this cool tool to check the speed of your mobile site.
6) Responsiveness fits future devices.
One of the great advantages of responsive design is that the size of the model was designed based on the size of the screen, not the device. This means that no matter what size screen someone is viewing your site on, it will display properly for that screen size.
So in the future, as new devices (TVs, watches, glasses, etc.) are being used for web browsing, your responsive website will remain beautiful.
Moving forward, it will be extremely important that your site provides mobile users with an easy-to-use experience. Having a mobile site is no longer simply a good resource – on the contrary, it is now a necessity and, consequently, has a big impact on the growth of your business.
What do you think about responsive design? Is it something you have already implemented or are you planning to do soon? Share your thoughts below!
