Looks like it's time to develop your mobile website.
2013 is the year that smartphones and tablets passed desktop and notebooks in overall sales popularity. According to the technology researchers at Gartner, tablet shipments will increase by 67.9%, while PC shipments will decrease by 11%. By 2015 there should be almost twice as many mobile devices in use versus traditional PCs. Increasingly, even the corporate world is moving to the mobile platform. Look inside any boardroom and you'll see mobile devices in the hands of the executives.
Given these facts, you would imagine that businesses would be racing to make the transition to mobile and tablets. Our company saw this trend approaching us years ago. Every web design we do here at CommonPlaces is a responsive design.
According to Adobe's 2013 Digital Marketing Optimization Survey, however, 45% of businesses don't have mobile sites, or mobile apps. In fact, only 30% of consider it a top priority in 2013. To say that this sounds short-sighted would grossly understate the conclusion. To add to the confusion, according to Econsultancy.com, 72% of companies are planning to increase their spending on mobile this year.
What's going on here?
When visitors come to a website on mobile, and those sites aren't responsive, they encounter a lot of serious issues. A poor design on a mobile device can lead to confusion with awful site navigation, and awkward screen size problems, among other complaints. This turns visitors off, obviously, and people managing websites don't want to aggravate their clients and potential clients. The end result, therefore, is a hesitation to go mobile at all. Businesses are afraid to take the leap, because they don't want to make a mistake.
You know the old saying, 'Lead, follow, or get out of the way'? Almost a year ago, Google let us know what they thought of businesses that put off transitioning to mobile. It's time for them to get out of the way. Mobile is here to stay.
Here are a couple of great tools I use to test websites on mobile smartphones and tablets:
- iPad Peek http://ipadpeek.com/
- Opera Mini simulator - http://www.opera.com/developer/opera-mini-simulator
Is your business going mobile? What have been your experiences? We'd love to know.
