Statistics reveal that mobile internet usage has actually doubled in the past few years. If you’re looking ahead to woo your visitors to a level that they become your loyal clients, then producing and owning a mobile-friendly web design is a must.
With an incredibly high proportion of mobile traffic for most small business websites, you can easily grab the opportunity of moving ahead of your competitors with a well designed and mobile responsive website.
The Most Important Aspects of Mobile Web Design for Small Business
So, where do you get started? Reading this post will allow you to gather eight useful tips and tricks on designing a small business website that is fully compatible with multiple mobile devices and platforms.
1. Choose the right Approach to Mobile Web Development
With a range of approaches available for the creation of a mobile-friendly website, it is essential to opt for the one that is capable of rendering a unique and scintillating experience to the mobile user.
There are several ways to approach the development of mobile-friendly website design:
Responsive
Here, the web page URL, images and HTML remain the same, with CSS rendering different rules on the basis of chosen browser’s width
RESS/Dynamic Serving/Adaptive
Here, as well the website URL remains the same, with only one difference that the server would send different HTML and CSS on the basis of mobile device that is sending the page request
Separate Mobile website
While such an approach is used for creating a website that is usually hosted on a sub-domain or a sub-folder, there are situations when a mobile website uses entire different URLs that are parallel with the desktop counterparts.
2. Identify the basic need of customers
While creating a responsive and mobile-friendly website design, your main goal should be to make the customers feel delighted.
So, I suggest that you identify what exactly the customers are expecting from your site.
Ensure the use of easy navigation because the same can ensure a flawless experience for the mobile visitor of your website.
3. Get a clear picture of what your competitors are up to
While it’s better to stick to your chosen approach for mobile website development, fetching ideas from your competitors is definitely not a bad idea.
Before you jump-start with your mobile site creation process, do look to other websites so as to find unique ideas that will allow you to stay ahead in the online competition.
4. Page Speed and Mobile Responsiveness
While responsive web design is a brilliant way of creating a mobile-friendly website, it is also a way of taking advantage of Google’s search algorithms and site speed expectation.
There might be a need for using a custom mobile website URL so as to impress mobile users instantly. Such a website will also render you the flexibility of tweaking web elements like texts, call to actions, website main menu and many more.
You should also consider the importance of page speed as a ranking factor and the need to incorporate fast page loading solutions like AMP technology.
5. Don’t forget to incorporate an eye-catchy and working search box
Since mobile devices come with smaller screen size, it becomes quite tedious to navigate from one web page to another.
It is here that a simple-to-use search box comes handy. The search box would allow users to retrieve results for their search, saving them from the hassles of spending time on searching the piece of information they want to access.
This would also boost your website’s mobile experience by a huge bound and leap.
6. Don’t ignore the Visual Indicators
Unlike the desktop browsers, mobile browsers aren’t equipped with built-in progress indicators like loading symbols.
So, I recommend that you provide visual feedback as a component of your mobile design.
For instance, each time a user taps on a particular button, you can have the button change its colour and appearance in order to represent the fact that a tap has taken place. there are numerous web building tools that will help you accommodate these design ideas.
7. Maintain consistency throughout the web design
While you might be definitely required to alter the web design layout or adjust the content for your mobile website; do pay special attention to maintain consistency (across multiple devices and platforms) in terms of core functionality.
All in all, a small business web design for mobile devices shouldn’t look like an alien when compared to the classic website design.
8. Keep the text input to a minimum
Although technology has advanced when it comes to entering an input on a mobile device; the same is still considered as a nuisance by a major population of smartphone users.
I suggest you keep the text input as minimal as possible.
There you have it. A few of the hand-picked tips and best practices that can allow you to come up with an absolutely brilliant mobile-friendly website that can impress mobile users on a positive note.
Thanks to Samuel Dawson who provided much of the insight in this article. Samuel is a certified professional in Designs2HTML Ltd.
He has been working here from the very beginning of the company. Samuel is responsible for converting PSD to HTML with efficient frameworks. He has shared his great knowledge of building a mobile-friendly website.
Infographic courtesy of http://www.infographicpost.com
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What a fascinating comment, Lazaro. Thanks for stopping by.