Just five years ago the majority of businesses wouldn’t have had a mobile friendly website. Today, however, a business without one would undoubtedly witness a drop in online conversions and poor SEO rankings. As a growing number of consumers ditch their desktop PC for their smartphone or tablet.
In this article I’ll be delving into the principles of designing a mobile website. I’ll take a look at what you need to consider when writing content for your website, how to best design forms and more.
1. Keep content short and sweet
Gone are the days when visitors to your website would happily read 600+ words of content on your homepage. Instead, today’s mobile visitors expect short and sweet content. Avoiding them having to repeatedly scroll or invest a considerable amount of time on the move.
Data also shows that mobile visitors to your website respond better to content that is broken down into sections. These could be paragraphs, subheadings or bullet points. Each of which helps break down long-form content for mobile visitors.
2. Make menus simple and concise
A simple and concise menu is an essential principle of a mobile friendly website. A hamburger menu allows you to hide a menu entirely until the visitor requires it. These menus can drop down, slide in or take over the entire page. Ultimately allowing the visitor to experience a similar navigation experience as they would on a desktop device.
Urban Media have utilised a hamburger menu brilliantly on our mobile website. The menu is entirely hidden, however, it is easily accessible by the end user. Allowing for an intuitive experience when navigating around their website.
3. Break forms up into steps
Whether a visitor is viewing your website on a desktop or mobile device, you still need to collect data from them through forms. This may be a contact, download or email subscription form. Unlike on a desktop device, however, mobile visitors will be less accepting of a long form.
As a result, when designing your businesses mobile friendly website, you should consider breaking up forms into steps. Giving the illusion of a shorter form requiring less input from the user. By breaking the form up into steps, it also makes the visitor fulfilled that they have got closer to an end goal.
4. Avoid using pop-ups
Pop-ups are a visitors’ worse nightmare when browsing a website on a mobile device. They are both intrusive to their experience and difficult to bypass. Therefore, a key principle of designing a mobile website is to avoid pop-ups at all costs.
5. Make it easy for prospects to contact you
While forms are a fantastic way for visitors to get in contact with your business, mobile visitors will often want to contact you by telephone. Therefore, ensuring your businesses telephone number is clearly displayed in the header and footer of your website is essential. This telephone number should also be clickable. Allowing the prospect to contact your business in one-click.
When implemented, the five principles above will allow your business to maintain a mobile friendly website that engages and converts visitors.
