How to Make a Website Mobile Friendly and Increase Traffic

Today there are 6.6 billion smartphone users which translates to 83 % of the world’s population using a smartphone. That’s why it makes sense to make your site mobile-friendly. Having a mobile-friendly website is no longer an option it’s a necessity. Some companies have business websites but they are not optimized for mobile users. If your site isn’t mobile - friendly your potential customers will move on to a site that is. More and more people these days use mobile devices to access the Internet while only using a laptop at work. According to Statista, 4.32 billion people use mobile devices to go online. Statistics clearly show the importance of a mobile-friendly website for your E-commerce business as 54.4 % of web traffic worldwide came from mobile devices(excluding tablets). As you can see more than half of web traffic is mobile. The funny thing is that even now you might be reading this article on your smartphone.

As an online business owner, there are two questions that you would want to ask:

• Why do you need a mobile-friendly website?
• How to make a website mobile-friendly and get more traffic?

Let’s start with the first question.

Why Is a Mobile-Friendly Website Important?

What is a mobile-friendly website? It’s a website that is made specifically for a user’s mobile device. It is easy to use without the need for the user to modify the settings or zoom in. This means that the content is easy to read, links can be clicked easily, and the site is easy to navigate. People can find what they are looking for quickly.

With the increased demand for E-commerce, mobile usage has become important. People now use mobile devices because it is super convenient. You can use them whenever you want or wherever you are. You can search and buy products and services you want, order food, book movie tickets, pay your taxes, etc. Furthermore, a mobile internet is not only available but it is affordable. A mobile-friendly website can boost your web traffic and can help you build trust with your audience. After visiting your website on their mobile phones, people will have a proper experience, and you will position yourself as a reliable source of information, products, and services. So, when customers trust your business, they are more likely to buy the products and services you offer. By making your site a joy to browse on the smartphone they are using, you don’t only attract traffic to your website but also increase sales and conversions. What’s more, Google loves mobile-friendly websites. Mobile-friendliness does matter for SEO as it’s Google’s ranking signal. Google is the search engine market leader. It has a market share of over 92%.

Given the popularity of this search engine, ranking high is kind of important for your business. You need to provide a good user experience for your customers because if you don’t, your traffic will drop significantly as a result. That’s why your website should look natural on mobile devices and tablets. Now that you know why having a mobile-friendly website is crucial for your E-commerce business let’s explore the second question.

How to Make a Website Mobile-Friendly and Get More Traffic?

In order to answer this question, we’ll take a look at 8 effective techniques website design companies should apply when designing and developing websites.

1. Avoid Flash

There are several reasons why using Flash is bad for your website’s mobile responsiveness. Let’s start with the most obvious one. Not all mobile devices support Flash. The reason why it is not good is that people won’t be able to load your site properly. Plus, it affects your page’s load time. If your page’s load time increases from 1 – 3 seconds, the probability of bounce rate increases by 32 %. Check the image below:

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Solution: use HTML5. HTML5 works just fine with mobile phones. It’s supported by all popular browsers like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, and Opera.

2. Responsive Design Matters for Your Web Traffic

A website with a responsive design will display properly on any device. If your potential customer visits your website from his mobile phone, your web page is viewable and it fits the screen size of his phone. According to Digital Silk, having a responsive web design is crucial for the SEO value of your site. Google likes responsive websites and people like them, too. So, if you want to rank higher on Google, you need to make your site mobile-friendly. How to do it?

Check out Google’s guide to mobile-friendly sites. It shows several ways to make your site mobile-friendly and three main mistakes that every entrepreneur should avoid.

How do you know if your site is mobile-friendly or not?

Google has a special tool that answers this question. It tells you if your website is friendly or not.

1. Go to https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly. Type the URL of your website into your browser.

2. Then click “TEST URL”. Within a few seconds, you’ll see a Page is mobile friendly message.

3. Tiny Buttons Might Lead to Frustration

The tiny buttons may give you trouble on your mobile phone. With tiny buttons, your “soon-to-be” customers won’t be able to click on them, and they can easily become annoyed. That’s why it makes sense to make your buttons bigger so they can work on their mobile phones. Testing each button on your iOS or Android device can help you understand if your buttons are properly sized. You’ll want to make your buttons “finger friendly”. When your buttons are too close to each other it might be hard to press the right one. They must be well-spaced.

4. Disable Autocorrect for Forms

The autocorrect feature is quite helpful but sometimes it can get a tad annoying. If your site has forms you should turn off autocorrect. These forms usually require names and addresses, and it turns names and addresses into more widely used words. By turning off autocorrect, you make sure that you are not driving people away from your website and that they aren’t leaving your site mid-purchase.

5. Compress Images

Images are a force to be reckoned with and are an important part of your content marketing strategy. They are nice to look at and make it easier for your potential customers to consume your content. Unfortunately, the large-sized wide images can slow down the loading speed of your website and they won’t look good on your mobile device. Speed and size do matter if you want to make a mobile website that turns visitors into customers. Visitors are more likely to shop on a mobile-friendly website. With the right image optimization strategy, you will make navigation easy. Compress your images but you need to make sure they still look sharp.

6. Incorporate the Viewport Meta Tag

Viewport meta tag is vital for responsive website design. It helps you control how your website shows up on mobile. This tag makes sure that the page width and device width are compatible. You don’t need to scroll from left to right.

7. Simple Web Design is Good for Your Business

Web design is an important part of your online business. It helps you attract a large audience and improve the user experience. As a result, you can increase sales and boost conversion rates. According to our friends from Webdesignds, having a simple, clean, minimalistic web design makes it easier for your visitor to navigate your site on a smartphone screen. All you have to do is remove unnecessary web elements from your site. A website that has fewer elements and properly sized images loads faster. By simplifying your web design you receive SEO benefits.

“Less is more” _{- Ludwig Mies van der Rohe}

8. Perform Mobile Testing as Often as Possible

If you want to deliver a great mobile user experience you need to test your website on your phone. You can ask your friends and employees to do the same. Just type the URL in your browser and press Enter. Spend some time browsing to check if everything is working correctly. Google is indexing your mobile page and it affects your site’s ranking and how much organic traffic you can drive to your website.

Conclusion

We live in an era, where the number of mobile users is rapidly rising every day. The age of mobile has reached new heights. So, having a mobile-friendly website is crucial nowadays. It can give your business a competitive edge. Ultimately, a site that is designed and optimized for mobile devices is a strong long-term investment because mobile online shopping is the future. Put your mobile users first and you should be fine. Mobile-friendly websites are prioritized by Google’s algorithm, so you should use this opportunity. Once you have a mobile responsive website, you can also consider creating a mobile app with a DIY tool. Mobile apps are optimized for performance and built for mobile-based environments. If you want to keep your SEO ranking high, increase web traffic and improve user experience, a mobile-friendly website is a must-have.

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