Mobile Website Design

If you are interested in designing a mobile website by yourself, please kindly visit this post or check out this highly recommended post at Smashing Magazine: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/11/03/how-to-build-a-mobile-website/

Now, if you are interested in a shortcut, I will give you one here. Why is it important to have a mobile website? According to some recent statistics there are 1 billion smartphones on the planet and the majority of them are also used to surf on the internet. Over 50% of local searches are made from mobile devices and these numbers are quickly growing year after year. According to some rough estimates the internet traffic generated by mobile devices will exceed the traffic of desktop machines by 2014.

More than 80% of the big companies in the US, including the Fortune 500 ones, have expressed the desire to implement mobile technology as part of their business strategy. This is to show that the internet is changing constantly, and it is important for every business to move with that change, and one of the ways to do that is to have a mobile website. The reason is that many people are now using different mobile devices that give them access to the internet, and with a mobile website, you will be able to meet the needs of those people. This also means there will be more money for your company.

The problem with mobile websites is complex. Downloading your regular website might not be easy even with relatively fast mobile internet. There are a few solutions for this. You can use PHP to check if a visitor is using a mobile device and redirect them to a lighter version – either using a modified stylesheet or redirecting to a separate mobile site.

So how can you build a mobile website then? The question is not easy because there are thousands of devices all with different specifications, screen sizes etc. If you are a proffessional designer you can go ahead and apply some of the tips outlined in this article by Smashing Magazine. If that makes little sense to you there is a much easier solution.

Hostpapa has launched its unique Mobile Website service in 2011. Obviously the goal is to make it easy for your mobile visitors to quickly and comfortably find the information they are looking for. Usually it is contact information like email and phone number, store location, opening hours, photos of your business, social media pages or links. The one-touch “Call Us” feature and the Google Maps integration with directions to your store is just the topping on the cake. You simply include a phone number on your site and visitors can call you with one simply click.  Here are some testimonials about Hostpapa’s new Mobile website builder.

You can control everything from logos and colors to specific design elements compatible with mobile devices such as iPhones, Blackberries, and other smartphones.

More about Mobile Websites

Mobile devices have presented a challenging and exciting opportunity to many internet marketers today. For many years, the popularity in the use of mobile devices to gain access to the internet has been increasing. Many studies show that more than 85% of adults in the US have mobile phones and new-generation ones with more advanced features are now entering the market, with big players coming in to develop different mobile phones that can give more convenience to the users. Many of them have been financially committed with billions of dollars in research and development.

It is now very necessary for any business to have an online presence, and a very good way of doing that is through a website. As more people now have mobile devices, it is very important to have a mobile website for your business. This enables you to have more customers and gain more exposure for the type of products and services that you are offering. Many businesses like restaurants, stores, coffee shops, movie theaters, and banks have benefited in many ways through a very good mobile website design with more than 20% of sales coming through mobile users.

According to studies, more and more people now rely on their mobile devices as the major tool for getting any information from the internet. These are some reasons for which you need to have a mobile website today:

1. Local search volume is growing at a rate of 50% every year. Take a look at these figures for local searches:

- In 2009 there were 1.2 billion.

- In 2010 there were 1.6 billion.

- 2011 expected to reach 2.43 billion at the end of the year.

- 2012 expected to reach 3.51 billion.

Many studies have also shown that there are more than 25 million users who take advantage of their mobile phones for searching the internet.

2. A mobile website is simple and easy to navigate because you will always come across simpler text and fewer graphics.

3. A mobile website is not built with the usual HTML language, making it faster and simpler for the mobile browser to decipher.

In your business mobile website design, it is necessary to start from just a few pages. The reason is that mobile phone users are only interested in the most relevant information. If you feel the need that it is important for them to know more, you may put a simple note or link indicating that more details can be found on your desktop website. These are some other things to consider in mobile website design:

a. You need to maintain the same brand image with your mobile website. The mobile website is not going to take the place of your desktop website. Therefore, make sure that it has the same look and feel of the desktop website that many people have known you for.

b. Make sure that the mobile website contains how your customers can easily locate your office. Some of the important things to include are:

- phone numbers

- driving directions

- your address

- a way to order

- information about your products and services

Make sure that they only need to click few links to get all those things, in most cases with less than 3 clicks. Also, those things should not be put at the bottom of the page where they will need to scroll down and down to view them.

c. Do not put too much video and audio content on your page. Those things will definitely slow down your mobile website, and in some cases, may cause the phone to freeze.

d. Your mobile website should have the features that are compatible with the make of mobile devices. There are some files with which mobile devices cannot work. For instance, iPhone cannot open flash files.

There are many benefits of having a mobile website for your business. However, it is necessary to understand that it takes longer to design a mobile website than a desktop website. The reason is that the mobile phone has its own different WAP accessing terminals. The one for Nokia devices is not the same as the one for Sony Ericsson, Samsun or LG.