There is an increased switch to mobile data use, and if your website does not cater to those users through a mobile responsive website, you risk alienating an increasing number of people every year. While this may seem like a sharp critique of your existing website strategy if you do not have a mobile responsive website, it is something to consider.
According to the latest figures by Smart Insights in their yearly survey, less than 10 percent of people under the age of 55 use websites in a desktop only manner. This means that a large number of people are using a multi-platform or mobile-only approach to browsing the internet. If you not catering to the mobile experience of these you ruin a great many conversion and traffic opportunities.
What does it even mean?
What does it even mean to have a mobile-friendly website? The concept is straightforward enough, it means that your website maximizes the user experience, regardless of what device a visitor is using at that time. For example, for mobile users, it means that your website adapts to their screen rather than them having to pinch or scroll through your website to see what it is you have to offer.
Reason #1 – You need to support the multi-device user
As we previously mentioned, visitors are not just coming to use our website with different screen sizes and devices across the world, but the same user may be visiting your device with a number of different devices. They may have had a great experience on the desktop site, determined to finally pull the trigger on a purchase, only to find out that your mobile site is lacking. This can be enough to imprint a negative connotation of your website in the eyes of a prospective impulse buyer. If you do not offer a mobile experience, you run the risk of that person just leaving your website, never to return.
Reason #2 – Google prefers mobile
We know that there are other search engines on the block, but do you really want to miss out on the traffic that is generated by Google? Google announced that it would rank results based on mobile all the way back in 2018. The reason for Google doing so is simple – more and more people are using mobile to search for something.
This is why you have a major problem on your hands if your website does not work on mobile. If you are showing up in the first few pages of Google results, your website may as well be invisible. Having a mobile responsive website simply makes sense.
Reason #3 – Take advantage of other companies not moving forward
More and more people are using their mobile device to browse the internet. You want to attract these mobile customers and ensure that you are ahead of the competition. There are many internet users who consider themselves mobile only, which means that there is a massive target audience for you to want to explore, and you want to do so because….
Reason #4 – Mobile users tend to buy more
It is convenient to buy something on your smartphone. If you decide that you want to order something at 9 PM at night, you don’t want to boot up your desktop and wait for everything to load. You want to grab the phone that you were probably already playing with, order and make sure that your order is scheduled for delivery. This perfectly caters to those impulse buyers. On average, around 35 percent of mobile users make a purchase online every week. Compare that to the 15 percent of desktop users who do so once a week and you will begin to understand why you want to cater to this audience.
Reason #5 – Make it easy for customers to contact you
Your customers want to make sure that they can get in touch with you. Before they will buy from you, before they are going to want to know what services you have to offer, they want to trust you. And having your contact information easily available is a big part of the trust factor.
No matter what type of website you have, no matter what service or product you sell, no matter what your audience is – you are going to benefit from a mobile responsive website. At this point, not having a mobile responsive website simply shows mobile users that you do not care about their experience – and why should they give you their business if you don’t care about their experience?
