I have wrote about the importance of having a mobile compatible website. If you own a small online business and your website is not currently mobile compatible then you are losing potential customers and falling behind your competition. Not having a mobile website is like telling your competition that I don't want to invest in a mobile compaitible website so you can split the customers that come to my site from a mobile device because what is happening is a potential customer will come to your website, see that it doesn't render properly on their mobile device and go to another website that does. That is our Phoenix web design team has wrote so many things talking about this. Since we have already written multiple articles about the importance of mobile compatible websites today I want to concentrate on whether you should go with a responsive design or a mobile website. The choice is 100% up to you and both have their benefits but let me give you 3 reasons why I prefer a responsive design over a separate mobile website.
- Search Engine Optimization – Not only is a responsive design better for SEO but it also is cheaper. Let me explain; with responsive design you only have one website so you only have run one search engine optimization campaign. On the other hand with a separate mobile site you have two separate websites and need to rank for both of them. Yes, you could only run one SEO campaign however you will be losing out on the customers you were targeting when you built your mobile website in the first place so why would you do this. You can't just not worry about SEO. SEO is the bread and butter of any successful internet marketing campaign. It is what is going to help you truly take your business to new heights. If your not currently running a campaign then I would strongly suggest you begin one today.
- Maintainence – A responsive design is much simpler to maintain. This is especially true for websites that produce a lot of content as it can be a real pain in the neck to make sure that it is transferred properly between multiple web properties. Running a small business is time consuming and at times can be very very difficult why would you want to give yourself one more thing that could go wrong?
- Better Reading Experience – Yes, fans of mobile websites will argue this and I guess it depends upon how you view it. They will say that mobile readers are only looking for certain information so they create website that only has the information that they believe a mobile user is looking for. Whereas a responsive design gives the reader all the information on the website so nothing will be missed. There is a reason mobile websites have to put the little button at the bottom of the page saying view full website. This is so mobile users can get all the information if they need too. The problem with this that then the mobile user is going to the website that is not mobile compatible so again they will be attempting to navigate your site which is not compatible with the device they are using. They will most likely leave your website and go to your competitors.
Now I understand every situation is different and without a doubt there are times I would suggest a mobile website over a responsive web design however, that being said my personal preference is to go with a responsive web design and feel like the points listed above make for a pretty compelling argument.