5 Reasons Why You Need a Mobile-Friendly Website!
BLOG / Web Development 3 May 2023
As we’ve always mentioned on our blogs, 66.34% of global traffic originates from mobile devices. On the contrary, the share of desktop traffic has shrunk to only 31.50%. In the next few years, the percentage of mobile traffic is only likely to continue to rise even further!
With more than half of the traffic coming from mobile devices, it wouldn’t be a wise decision to focus on desktop users only. That’s why around 80% of the world’s top websites are now mobile-first oriented. And according to Google, 74% of users said they are more likely to visit a website again if it is mobile-friendly.
All of this should be enough of a reason for you to consider adopting a responsive, mobile-friendly design on your websites!
So, let’s look at what is a mobile-friendly website design as well as the importance of a mobile-friendly website in today’s world!
What is a mobile-friendly website?
A website that loads and displays correctly & fast on all mobile devices regardless of screen size & shape is called a mobile-friendly website. The mobile version of a website is termed the “responsive version.” Recently, newer challenges have been imposed on websites from phone brands that started creating foldable phones with elastic screen shapes and sizes.
It should be noted that just because a website is mobile-friendly doesn’t mean it won’t display correctly on desktops or bigger screens!
In fact, mobile-friendly websites adjust themselves depending on the user’s device screen (the act of being “responsive”). So, if visitors access the website from a PC/laptop, they can see the PC/laptop version of the site. Similarly, mobile or tablet users will see a version of the site that is optimized for their devices.
Well, the rise in mobile traffic simultaneously increases the importance of having a mobile-friendly website. And our agency’s aware that any web design & development project we work on should, by default, end in a mobile-friendly (responsive).
It is still a good idea to always ask questions related to mobile-friendly design with other potential web design agencies. That’s because some may ask for extra charges for the responsive version..!
Ideally, you shan’t pay any extra money to get a mobile-friendly website… And the responsive version is often taken care of by the development engineers with little to no collaboration with the web designers.
Is your website mobile-friendly?
Let’s say that you already have a website or your web design agency has just made you a brand new website. In that case, how can you check if your website is mobile-friendly or not?
Surprisingly, the process of checking whether your site is mobile-friendly or not is relatively straightforward. You can use any of the following tools to check the responsiveness (mobile-friendliness) of a website:
Both tools will provide good insights & explain how they can be fixed.
Pro Note: Often, your in-house developer will suggest using Plugins or Modules to solve a problem. Try to avoid doing this and solve the problem from the code base because modules and plugins end up hurting the overall website health. We recommend using SEMrush’s site audit tool & try to get a health score of at least 95%.
5 reasons why A mobile-Friendly website is important
Let’s look at 5 reasons that further highlight the importance of having a mobile-friendly website:
Better rankings
Available data suggests that around 53% of web traffic comes from Google Search (organic traffic). One would have to be so careless to miss on such a huge traffic potential by not having a mobile-friendly website.
Google, de facto, has made it clear that “mobile-friendly designs” have become a ranking signal ever since April 2014! So, if your website is not mobile-friendly yet, chances are your content is decaying in the forgotten SERPs & isn’t getting any share of the aforementioned stat!
In other words, the first and most essential benefit you gain from having a mobile-friendly website is gaining better positions on Google’s SERPs.
Accessibility
Another reason which highlights the importance of mobile-friendly websites is accessibility. By providing a website design that is friendly for mobile & other small-screen devices, by default, you give greater accessibility to web visitors.
Visitors would access your website from a variety of different devices. On the other hand, visitors would also leave your site for the competitors if it isn’t accessible on mobile devices.
As mentioned earlier, the traffic coming from mobile devices has already crossed the 60% mark. And you don’t want to close the door to such a percentage!
Improved user experience
A mobile-friendly website is easy to use on a smaller screen, which enhances the user experience (UX) of your site’s mobile visitors. By ensuring, per se, the font size, images, CTAs, & other elements are adjusted based on the mobile screen size, a responsive website provides visitors with an immaculate experience. This makes it easier for users to enter your funnel and be converted at later stages!
This just tells us why a positive user experience is so important! According to UserGuiding research, around 44% of online users said they are more likely to share a bad online experience with their friends. Similarly, up to 88% of online users said they wouldn’t revisit a website if they had a poor user experience!
Again, no reasoned marketer or webmaster would love to overlook such success components!
Better conversion rate
We established that a mobile-friendly website provides a seamless experience to mobile users. But did we mention that a good experience increases the chances of getting the visitor to take action!? Per se, signing up for a trial, making a purchase, contacting the sales team, etc.
Once again, we remind you that providing a positive experience to mobile users means opening the door to 60% of Google’s search traffic. And this would definitely lead to more inbound leads & better conversions!
According to UserGuiding, you can increase the conversion rate on your site by 400% simply by providing a good user experience! And a mobile-friendly design is at the heart of any good UX strategy!
So, that’s yet another benefit to emphasizing the importance of mobile-friendly websites at this time.
Competitive advantage
Despite the rise in mobile traffic, there are still many websites that operate upon non-mobile-friendly design & techs. So, this means that adopting a mobile-friendly design grants your business a competitive edge over other brands in your industry.
A common scenario to consider in this regard is the following: a client’s about to make a high ticket sale & happen to enter a competitor’s website… the font was too small and the website was overall hard to navigate and interact with. The client bounces off to the SERP again and this time clicks on your result! 2 seconds later, the website’s already downloaded with clear CTAs and a clean layout!
In that case, congrats for the sale!
Search Engines follow and study users’ behavior across websites. And when those engines detect that your website outperform other ones in session durations & actions, expect more leads to start coming in! Engines will start recommending you more and more! This conversion sends Google & other SERPs
Conclusion
To sum this whole thing up in a sentence: Get that phone friendly website asap! Our team is here and we offer you both a free consultation & the opportunity to get your website delivered in no time!
Hamid Nouasria
Hamid is a professional on-page SEO specialist and content writer. He holds a B.A degree in Media Literacy, and he is interested in marketing, leadership, and sociology.
