Simple Guide to Effective Optimization of a Mobile Site

Optimizing a mobile web site is a lot easier when you use responsive web design to build it. While this method of web design is more complicated you are better off having your website designed this way because it is the best way to ensure the site’s usability. If your website is older and you really don’t want it undergoing any major changes, you should have a separate mobile site designed. This is the recommended course of action if your regular and mobile websites will be displaying different content.

Dual Website Versions

Many companies have embraced the idea of having one version of their website that can be viewed on a desktop computer and another version of their website that is optimized for mobile devices. In the United States the Quantcast list of the top 10,000 sites reports that 73% of those sites have a separate website for mobile devices than they do for desktop computers. Of the 20 biggest retail companies in the United Kingdom, 14 of the 20 have a website that can easily be viewed on a mobile device as well as a computer and 13 of those 14 companies have separate desktop and mobile versions of their website.
When it comes to having your website optimized for viewing on a mobile device, you will need to consider things that will help you better determine your website needs. The first aspect of the website you should think about is the structure of the information you wish to include on your website and how the information will appear to Internet users. You want to determine how they are interacting with your website. If you need help with this you can sign up for Google Analytics, which can help you determine how much traffic your website is getting.
After you have obtained information about the amount of traffic your website is getting, you need to take that knowledge and use it to make sure your landing page is optimized. This is also when you want to take a close look at your website’s bounce and conversion rates. If you can, you will also want to determine what keywords people are using to find your website.

Once you have a better idea of how your website is being viewed you can use that information to make sure your mobile site is set up to be as user friendly as possible. You should determine which website features your mobile site has that your desktop website does not.

Tablets

In addition to focusing on mobile phone users, you also want to focus on the way in which your website appears on a tablet’s screen. A design that looks great on a mobile device won’t necessarily look as good on the screen of a tablet since tablets have much bigger screens than mobile phones. If you really want to impress users who access your website through a tablet you may have to come up with a design that is different from both your desktop website design and your mobile website design.

When you have a mobile website design that you are happy with, you need to start tracking analytics for each version of your website. You need to make sure that your Google Analytics tracking code was properly implemented when your website was designed. You also need to concentrate on your SEO efforts by creating and submitting an XML sitemap to search engines link Bing and Google.

Taking these steps will strengthen your website and attract users to your mobile site as well as your desktop site.