I was at the Tulsa Surgical Arts course last weekend and one of the questions that got a lot of discussion was mobile web sites. So, I thought I would reiterate how to determine your needs regarding mobile sites.
First off, there are three kinds of sites these days in general... standard web sites, smart phone sites and tablet sites. Standard web sites are sites designed for best use on computers and laptops. Smart phone sites show best on smart phones and tablet sites show best on tablets like iPads. And, yes, it is possible for a standard site in HTML to be seen on all three kinds of hardware. But, statistics show that when the site is not built for the hardware, the experience diminishes.
This is why we have established a few benchmarks that are easy to follow. Log into your Google Analtyics and click on the Visitors menu button. Click on Mobile and it will show you your mobile use.
If you 5% of your traffic is via mobile or iPad devices, it’s time to get a starter mobile site. When that number reaches 10%, you should have the site in place. A vast majority of our clients are reaching up to and beyond 20% mobile traffic, so much so that they are requiring both mobile and iPad sites because the percentage of iPad users is so significant.
One thing to consider is the number of users that make up those percentages. If you are a high traffic site, even a low percentage of mobile or iPad users can make up several hundred visits. So, use the percentages as a guideline and use common sense to guide you when deciding to accommodate visitors using these mobile hardwares.
The bottom line is this: you should be most appealing to all users regardless of the hardware they are using. With more and more users going mobile and user trends following right along, it‘s important to not appear outdated because you don’t have a mobile or iPad site that makes the experience as good as possible for the mobile or iPad user.
If you have any questions on mobile or iPad sites or if you want to add these to your Internet strategy, please email me at donald@dogstarmedia.com.
