Picture this
A potential customer searches for your website on their mobile phone. It comes up, but it's tiny... they can't read the text, the pictures, video and other content are impossible to see, so they navigate away to a competitor with a responsive site. Disaster! You need to fix it, and fix it fast. Here's why mobile-friendly websites are crucial to the success of your business online.
What is responsive web design?
Responsive web design, RWD, makes web pages render well on a variety of devices and screen sizes, with layouts that automatically adjust and adapt to the user's gadget. It enables your site to be easy to read, easy to navigate and delivers an excellent user experience, whatever device it's being viewed on.
Every good web design company will automatically create your site using RWD. Legacy sites don't always have the capability built in, and if you haven't consciously arranged for a responsive website, you probably don't have one. To check, simply look at your site on a variety of machines and see how it displays. Does it work equally well on all of them?
Why does adaptive web design matter?
Responsive design generates extra revenue. In a world where Google has prioritised mobile search and a high percentage of people use their mobile devices to search the web, not being responsive can be a business-killer. Responsive designs increase your visibility on search engines, which means more site visitors, better lead generation, extras conversions and more sales. Result!
According to Statista.com (https://www.statista.com/topics/2479/mobile-search/ ) in 2018 around 64% of paid Google search clicks originated with mobile devices, and they accounted for almost 56% of all click-throughs, with Bing mobile searches at 33%. In the USA alone the number of mobile search users is expected to increase to 221 million by 2020. No wonder Google favours responsive design, in response to public demand. It'd be crazy not to.
How much money could you lose by not having responsive web design?
You should be able to roughly quantify the amount of money you're missing out on, based on your current sales and UK mobile usage stats. It's different for every business, and there are several key factors to think about.
Because Google has changed the way it crawls the internet, indexing mobile sites before desktop sites, you can face problems if you don't have a really good mobile version of your site. Mobile-unfriendly websites are pushed to the back of the queue, and that means you can potentially lose a lot of business. Because paid search also favours mobile these days, there's no wriggle room.
Branding matters as well. If your brand is perceived as being behind the times, you'll lose custom. A mobile-unfriendly site looks very dated, even if it's one that you can pinch and expand on a tiny screen. And a bad experience affects your brand equity.
If you're into ecommerce things can get even worse. Every trend reveals mobile matters to buyers. In fact 62% of smartphone users have bought online with their phone. And it looks a lot like at least 40% of mobile users will defect to a competitor after having a bad experience on a non-mobile site. Add the fact that almost 80% of shoppers use their mobile to look up reviews and testimonials, and it's just essential. No arguments.
Speed is really important. In fact it's vital. Long loading times are a big no-no. Users will back off in no time. Google knows this, of course, and they favour mobile sites. Their Accelerated Mobile Pages project is a huge open-source effort designed to help sites load quickly on mobile. It's the future, and let's face it, the future is actually right now.
Social media matters too. A strong social media strategy is one of the key foundations of digital marketing, one of the most popular ways for people to interact and engage with you. Sharing things breeds trust, trust means word of mouth recommendations, and that's gold dust. Sharing content fast is vital, and when a site isn't mobile-friendly it makes sharing tricky. Another fail, especially when people can't even see your 'share' button because it's so fiddly and small.
Get mobile friendly – Get professional
If your site isn't responsive, we might be able to help you make it so. Every site we create is responsive by nature. Let's talk about getting you properly responsive as fast and painlessly as possible.
Find out more about our web design services in Oxford or get in touch with us today by filling in our contact form or calling us on 01844 888 777.
In the meantime, you might also like to take a look at some of our recent responsive website design work.