If Your Website Isn’t Optimized for Mobile Devices, You'll Be Left in the Dust
Most consumers research businesses and products on the Internet before making purchase-oriented decisions. When deciding on a place to take your district manager for lunch or which air conditioner to buy for your office, you often go to your tablet, smartphone, or other mobile devices to hunt for information online. It has become the premier way to find the best place and product at the most competitive price.
“The world is going mobile, and it’s the next sales and marketing platform for businesses. To stay ahead of their competition, businesses must go mobile,” advises Carolyn Trinta, vice president of marketing at Magellan LLC, a company specializing in mobile apps. Recent studies support this, with statistics showing that over 10 percent of Internet traffic comes from mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, and 40 percent of online shoppers use their mobile device to check out new products.
The fact that more people are using the Internet to research products for possible purchases illustrates how having a Web presence has become an essential part of doing business in today’s world. According to the Pew Research Internet Project, 47 percent of the people researching local businesses (other than restaurants, bars, and clubs) use online resources. This compares to the 30 percent that use local newspapers, 22 percent that rely on word-of-mouth recommendations, and 8 percent that use local television ads.
Among people making purchases on the Internet, 46 percent prefer using their mobile device. As these devices become more popular, their usage as a way to access information and make purchases will only increase. This is particularly true as the number of businesses tailoring their Web presence to include people with mobile devices increases.
Currently, 66 percent of small business owners use a mobile device, but only one third of small businesses have their business websites optimized for them. This means there’s a lot of room for growth in terms of businesses creating websites that are mobile friendly. Regardless of the industry, business owners who don’t jump on this trend are ignoring and alienating a growing percentage of their customer base, which means only one thing — lost revenues.
How This Trend Affects Your Business
“Millions of customers are using mobile devices when shopping,” says Haris Bacic, web designer at Adficient. “Mobile will become an even bigger part of our lives and mobile shopping will be further simplified. The entire shopping experience will be fast and easy and users won’t have to fill out any forms to purchase products, and payment information will be saved on the phone already, or customers will use a pay-by-phone-number method.”
Because your business’s customer base is continually increasing their use of mobile devices, it becomes essential to adapt to this skyrocketing trend.
Overall, mobile device users expect the website they visit to be geared toward their immediate needs, and if your business site isn’t mobile friendly, you stand to lose.
Developing a Mobile-Friendly Internet Presence
The key to developing a strong mobile Web presence is to use responsive web design, meaning that your site is easily navigable by any device that uses the Internet. Says Dave Polykoff, systems architect for Brand.com, “If you’re building your site for the first time, or rebuilding your site, responsive design is necessary for a great mobile design. Not only does it allow a more enjoyable and consistent feel, but also is a critical part of how Google will rank your site.”
Some of the ways you can make your website more mobile friendly are by keeping it simple, avoiding drop-down menus, and using quality images that look good on a smaller screen. Be sure to keep your site informational and use click-to-call contact information. In addition to easy navigation, you need to make sure the site has a quick load time. Nothing annoys mobile users more than a website that takes too long to load.
In terms of future trends, Brenda Stoltz, CEO of Ariad Partners, LLC, sums it up this way: “I think the trends are clearly heading in the ‘more’ direction when it comes to mobile—more apps, more technology, more users, and more mobile purchases. It reminds me of social media about five to seven years ago when it was just starting to take off. Mobile is the same. If you’re selling anything, you’ll want to make sure you can be found, viewed, and users can purchase your goods on a mobile device.”
Before it’s too late, make it a priority to put your company’s product or service at your customers’ fingertips—no matter where they’re shopping from.
