The number of people who own smartphones has been consistently rising for years and doesn’t look like it’s going to slow down anytime soon. Approximately 50% of people who own a cell phone have chosen a smartphone. What does this mean? That your websites need to be able to adapt for the smartphone viewer. Below are a few articles that may offer some techniques on improving your website’s mobile design.
Mobile Sites: Choosing an Implementation Process & Strategies
The world is going mobile and so are our websites. Device and platform fragmentation is the new norm.
No matter your approach, the mobile landscape is a tricky, expansive space of uncertainty filled with twists and turns that would give even the most solid minded developer or site owner points to pause. So what to do?
Learn more mobile strategies from Search Engine Watch here
Responsive Web Design: Introduction & Impact
Last week, there was little surprise when Google’s Pierre Far announced responsive design as the company’s formal recommendation for mobile delivery. Responsive Web Design is the approach that a design should be flexible enough to adapt to the screen size and platform of the visiting user.
This (relative) uniformity in user experience would appear to be wonderful for search engines and developers alike.
Google was going to face a major conundrum: if every site had an entirely separate experience for mobile and desktop users, which site would actually be the one worthy of the incoming link? Would that rank pass to the mobile site and, if so, how often and why?
Learn more from Search Engine Watch about Responsive Web Design here
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Finally, for those of you looking for a more in-depth guide to mobile optimization, check out “The Mobile Web Optimization Guide” from Opera.
Mobile-Friendly: The Mobile Web Optimization Guide
Introduction
If I had a Euro for everyone who asks me at conferences how they can mobilize their website, I’d be extraordinarily rich as well as breathtakingly handsome.
It’s easy to see why people wish to make their sites mobile friendly; Gartner research suggests that by 2013, mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access device worldwide. And don’t forget other visits from devices such as game consoles like Nintendo Wii, DSi, web-enabled TVs, in-car browsers and the like.
Many customers are already using mobile devices as their main method of Web access, particularly in emerging markets — the July 2009 Statistical Report on Internet Development in China states that the proportion of [people] accessing the Internet by mobile increased enormously from 39.5% in late 2008 to 46% in June 2009, while the proportion of using desktops and laptops decreased. That translates to 150 million people. In the developed world, many have a mobile device as their secondary method of accessing the Web while they’re out and about.
It’s a truism that on the Web there is always someone offering the same service as you are. And if you’re not catering for the mobile user, you can be sure that your competitors are. In the current harsh economic climate, sending customers into the arms of the competition doesn’t succeed as a business strategy.
This article provides an overview of three different strategies to make your websites work across all devices. We’ll call them mobile-aware websites, as they’re not specifically for mobile sites, but they will work on mobile, as well as across different alternative browsing devices. These strategies are not mutually exclusive; you can mix and match as your project, budget and sanity allows.
“The Mobile Web Optimization Guide” from Opera
