How to have the Best Mobile Website Design
Today’s websites must be designed for today’s users, and today’s users are viewing websites on mobile devices more often than desktops. Pew Research Center data indicates that “34% of people access the Internet predominantly from their mobile phones.” If your website isn’t mobile-friendly, or responsive to multiple devices (including smartphones, tablets and desktops), then you’re behind the times.
Best Practices in Mobile Website Design
If you’re ready to join the party, here’s what you need to know:
1. Keep it Simple.
Long-winded paragraphs or walls of text are likely to send your mobile viewers running. Users viewing your site on a mobile device are scrolling fast and have a limited amount of viewing space. Therefore, it’s important to get to your point as quickly as possible. Otherwise, you risk losing their attention (and desire to scroll).
2. Go Beyond Mobile-First.
Optimizing your site for mobile users first - versus for desktop users first is a step in the right direction. After all, Google has been penalizing websites that aren’t mobile responsive since April of 2015, so this not exactly anything new.
However, by going beyond designing for mobile users first, it’s important not to neglect the fact that today’s users are switching from one device to another all-day long. The ultimate goal should be to optimize the user experience on any and all devices.
3. We’ve Entered the App Era.
Today’s mobile users are using mobile apps more than ever. In fact, according to Yahoo's Flurry analytics, “90 percent of consumer's mobile time is spent in apps.” Mobile applications, when designed well, can make the user experience easier and faster. If you haven’t developed a mobile application for your website yet, you may want to consider it.
4. Page Speed is Critical.
Speed has always been a key element in website design, and even more so in mobile web design. So, it’s nothing new that your mobile site really can’t afford to be too slow. What today’s users define as slow was probably considered lightning speed when the internet first began. Our attention spans and patience levels have become so short that we haven’t left much room for error.
What is “fast?” According to Google, less than half a second is ideal, but the threshold is about 2 seconds. If your website takes more than 2 seconds to load, it may be considered “slow.”
5. Keep Forms Short.
Forms with a lot of fields to fill in are far less likely to get submitted. People don’t have the time or the patience to fill out several fields, especially when one or more of them could be combined. By using single input fields whenever possible, you will do your users a favor. Mobile users especially appreciate short forms, since there is only so much room on the screen, and typing on a smaller device can be annoying.
6. Simplify the Navigation.
Mobile users are looking for fast answers or solutions. Full screen navigations, intuitive categories, and front-and-center search tools are all great ways to help users find what they’re looking for as quickly as possible.
Tab and navigation bars work well for sites and applications with only a few different options. They allow the most important navigation options to be accessible with a simple tap.
These are just a handful of the many mobile web design techniques we recommend. If you need help developing your mobile website or application, contact SMILE media today. As one of the best design firms in Boston, SMILE media has the skills and resources to build an exceptional mobile web design for your business.
