Quick! Do You Know If Your Website Is Mobile Friendly Enough?

If you take anything away from this blog, let it be this: People are busy and they need your website to be mobile-friendly so they can get what they want and move on ASAP.

Over 50% of all web traffic is now on a mobile device. Mobile users typically have information they are seeking or a task they need to complete. In fact, 91% of smartphone users use their phone to figure out how to complete a task, and because of this users need the experience to be quick and to-the-point.

As an agency, we keep this in mind when we are working on a site and we can boil down our approach to three important attributes of the user experience: speed, efficiency, and consistency.

Speed

We live in an attention economy. We have a finite amount of time in a day and what we spend it on is how we demonstrate value. That includes actions taken on your website.

If we don’t capture someone right away, we could lose them entirely and that is why we need the mobile experience to be fast.

And when we say fast, we mean fast. A mobile website should load in 2 seconds. Even a 1-3 second delay could increase the bounce rate by 32%. That’s not all, since 2018, Google has been penalizing slow-loading mobile websites in search results.

Efficiency

Something we talk about a lot when coming up with content structure and the design of a website is helping people work smarter and not harder. We talk about it with our internal processes and with our client’s websites.

Just like in life, it’s crucial we keep things that are important to mobile users in easy to reach places, and to do so in a way that maps their expectations and patterns.

Here’s what that looks like throughout our content strategy, design process, and site development:

• Search Functionality- If your site is searchable, keep that functionality in the headers, not hidden in the menu.
• Footers- Some of the elements a user expects in the footer includes an address which you can click for directions, a clickable phone number, social links, and a way to contact you through the website, such as a form link.
• Clickable Elements- When we include clickable elements on your site we always make sure they are large enough for a finger tap, a feature that Google looks for. If your elements are too small it could harm your SEO value.
• Navigation– Short, sweet, and to the point! Users don’t want to scroll through a list of links. Keep your navigation short and meaningful.
• Calls-To-Action- Users should be able to get to the most important places on your site with no scrolling. That means that calls-to-action should be above the fold on your site.
• Image Sizes- Compressing and resizing images is a great way to further reduce page load time.
• Minimize Effects- We love sites with special effects but mobile does not! This is why we recommend eliminating special effects and animation on mobile to ensure there is no impact to mobile page speed.
• Ecommerce- Eliminate forced login until absolutely required! Users should be able to shop, add to cart and get all the way to check out before logging in.

Consistency

Despite special considerations for the mobile process it is important we keep the look and feel across desktop and mobile similar. User experience (UX) consistency across devices increases trust in your brand and that is paramount.

Mobile websites should never link to a “full website” or “desktop website” as this decreases trust and makes mobile users feel like they are getting an inferior experience. Ecommerce sites or any site with login functionality should save important activities across platforms. For example, a user should be able to add items to their mobile cart and complete their purchase on desktop without starting over and vice-versa.

At the end of the day, everyone just wants a web experience that is quick, intuitive, and helps them take action. Is your site up to these mobile standards? If not, send us a message to talk today!