The Importance of a Responsive Website
One day, not too far off in the future, younger coworkers will be amazed at the fact that you worked through a time when all a website required to be “good” was a domain, a host and some content. Those days are long over. A lot has changed in recent years, and not all companies have kept up with the trends. Some are still stuck with an archaic website. Nothing screams, “We don’t want your business” more than a clumsy old website.
In 2014, the number of mobile users accessing the internet surpassed the number of desktop users. It was a big moment that confirmed what we had been waiting for: more people are using tablets and smartphones to get around the internet. With this advancement, websites have to be configured differently. They can’t just have a fixed number of pixels and be designed for a desktop audience. Even gaming consoles, e-readers and web terminals can get a slice of internet pie.
That’s why websites have been turning to the perfect solution: responsive design. Responsive web pages automatically adjust themselves to fit any screen size. The design eliminates many of the problems that would otherwise exist if websites were configured only for desktops such as long loading times, jumbo sized images and too much scrolling and zooming. Plus, companies don’t need to spend the extra time and money to make a mobile version and desktop version of their website.
Let’s take a look at five great reasons to become responsive, if you haven’t already.
1. Make Your Users Happy
These days, it’s all about the user experience. If you can provide visitors with a good user experience, they’ll be much more likely to return and refer you to their friends. If you can’t provide them with this, a second shot is unlikely. Fortunately, responsive design is built for the user and does an excellent job of providing a pleasant experience. No scrolling or resizing is needed, and users can enjoy the quality of your website while using their favorite device.
2. Save Your Company Some Money
So many things are costly these days, so it’s nice to know that you can actually save money by choosing a responsive design. A responsive design is ONE site, not two. If you have two dedicated sites, you need to fund the health of two separate web addresses. Not to mention, the headaches come in twos. That’s two sites to maintain, update, track and measure.
A responsive website is convenient, too. All of your visitors will be directed to a single site no matter what device they choose to use. This makes it easy to run analytics, monitor site traffic, make updates and more. It’s also good for SEO because mobile traffic is redirected to the same site as desktop traffic.
3. Google Says to Do It
No one’s condoning peer pressure here, but we do feel it’s important to listen to Google. They kind of make the rules, after all, so what they like, you should like. And they like responsive websites. Google states that responsive web design is its recommended mobile configuration and the industry’s best practice.
It’s understandable why Google would prefer these sites because they make it easier and more efficient to crawl, index and organize content compared to having two URLs and HTMLs. Google has a lot more work to do if you have two separate sites that need to be crawled and indexed. So if you’re not going to do it for yourself or your users, do it for Google.
4. Give Yourself a Break
Why make things any harder on yourself than they have to be? Having a separate desktop and mobile site means that you have to run two separate SEO campaigns. Though we don’t consider ourselves to be math experts, we’re certain that it’s much easier to run one SEO campaign than two.
But what about optimizing your campaigns for a mobile audience? Isn’t that better?
Good point. It is ideal to optimize for keywords that are more likely to be searched on a smartphone such as “pizza place near me”. However, a separate mobile site is not a requirement for a mobile SEO strategy, so you don’t need to have a separate website. There’s absolutely no reason why mobile-specific keywords can’t be included into a responsive design site too.
5. Make Your Brand Look Good
If you’ve ever taken the time to study a responsive design, you’ll notice that it’s extremely fluid. This is good. The content moves seamlessly across all screen resolutions and devices. It doesn’t matter whether someone is reading your blog on a huge monitor or a tiny smartphone. The goods are all right there, and they’re easy on the eyes.
Responsive pages are just as their name implies. They respond beautifully to the user’s needs and are highly intuitive. The content is the right size, the images load quickly and the design fills the allotted space perfectly. This fluidity gives your brand a better image and shows that you care about your audience and the interaction they have with your website. Score.
No one can make you choose a responsive design for your website. It’s completely up to you. But if you’re stuck with an outdated website, or you’re convinced that two separate websites are right for you, we strongly encourage you to reconsider given the many benefits of responsive web design. At the very least, give us a call and see how affordable this user-friendly design can really be!
