Tech and Trends:- Research shows that if your website design isn’t optimized for mobile, you’re losing sales. Around 57 percent of mobile users abandon websites if they take more than 3 seconds to upload, and 30 percent abandon purchase transactions if their shopping cart isn’t mobile friendly.
Since websites are essential for businesses to succeed in the digital age, it makes sense to optimize your web design for mobile devices. Surprisingly, though, the vast majority of the websites on the Internet are not optimized for mobile use.
Here are five reasons why you must have a mobile optimized website:
1. Mobile users have different needs
Mobile users differ from desktop users in that they want quick, easy to understand bites of information. These users tend to buy based on their impulses, with statistics showing mobile shoppers spending more per purchase than their desktop counterparts.
This trend emphasizes the importance of optimizing your website design to match mobile users’ needs while browsing your website. By keeping purchase or inquiry functions intuitive, you’ll align more precisely with mobile users that make decisions on the go.
2. Mobile Generates Traffic
Over one-quarter of web searches are initiated on mobile devices, by a billion or more users worldwide. For this reason, mobile websites are becoming more important than desktop versions. Sources report smartphone users are searching mobile websites and apps while watching TV programs, commuting to school or work and while using their desktop computer.
Google’s Hummingbird update indicates that the future of search is mobile, and websites that aren’t optimized for mobile devices will experience downgrades in their search ranking.
When you offer a satisfying mobile experience, people are more engaged with your brand and are more likely to return to your website on other devices. Over 90 percent of Internet users report moving between devices to complete tasks. When your website is designed for mobile functionality, it creates affinity with users.
Conversely, if your mobile website is tough to navigate users are likely to give up and go to the competition. They are not going to take the time to switch to a desktop computer. If you cannot provide what your users want, when they want it, you’re losing sales and giving your competitors additional revenue.
4. Higher Conversions
Mobile users visiting desktop websites tend not to convert to sales. The call to action on web pages are often obscured, links are harder to click and contact information is buried in jumbled menus. Most shoppers have little patience for awkward websites, and one-third of them will quit a transaction if the site isn’t optimized for mobile.
To fully take advantage of mobile, CTAs should be easy to spot and click and contact information should be one of the first things users notice. Over 80 percent of shoppers note that mobile purchases are impulse-driven and they’re more likely to buy from a site and company that provides an engaging mobile experience.
5. Lower Your Bounce Rate
Although content may look great on a desktop computer, it may be unreadable on a mobile device. Visitors will leave your website if they have to squint, scroll and maneuver to read illegible type. The problem gets worse if your website runs flash or other features that require add-ons to display in a browser. If you don’t have a professionally optimized and designed website, your bounce rate on mobile devices is going to be unnecessarily high. An appropriate and intuitive user experience will engage visitors for longer and persuade more of them to purchase or make inquiries.
To check the mobile health of your website, pickup your smartphone and ask yourself these questions:
Does the website load in less than three seconds?
Does the website draw your attention to key selling points?
Is the content easy to understand?
Is the website easy to navigate?
Is it easy to identify and select the call to action?
Does the site provide a good user experience?
Would you visit the website if it was not your own?
If you answered “no” to most of these questions, then it’s time to optimize your website design for mobile and capture the traffic and sales you’ve been missing. In our definitive guide, The 11 Essentials of a Successful Website Design, mobile optimization is ranked number 8.
