Partner Article

Why the mobile web is important for businesses

Just a few short years ago, browsing the Internet on a mobile phone was somewhat of a novelty. Today, it?s rapidly becoming the norm, and that is something that all businesses with an online presence need to pay serious attention to.

According to a recent survey by Google?s Our Mobile Planet website (full data available at http://www.ourmobileplanet.com/en/downloads/), 60% of 1,000 smart-phone owning respondents said that they used their device to do online product searches. This though is not the only statistic from the survey, which reveals the growing commercial importance of the mobile web, and illustrates why all businesses need to take it seriously.

• 29% of respondents had ?purchased a product or service? on their smartphone
• 37% used it to search for local restaurants and pubs
• 12% said that they used their smartphone to ?look for information about local business or services? on a daily basis, 24% said they did so weekly, and 29% monthly
• 56% said that they had used the smartphone to make a purchase in the past month
• 42% of respondents said that they purchased products or services on a monthly basis using their smartphone

Clearly people are using their mobile phones to do more than just play Angry Birds. But why should these statistics matter to businesses with a website? For one thing, because of the smaller screens of smartphones, your webpage won?t automatically display in the same way as it does on desktops and laptops. In order to take full advantage of the mobile web boom, you need to make sure that your site is mobile friendly. In the survey, 65% said they expected the: ??websites I visit on my smartphone to be as easy to navigate and access as they are when I visit them on the desktop PC?. If that isn?t a hint at what your customers want, we don?t know what is?

The survey also highlighted that businesses need to try extra hard in their SEO efforts if they want to gain the attention of the modern smartphone wielding consumer. When asked: ?How many search result pages do you look at when conducting a search with your Smartphone?? 59% of respondents said that they only look at the first search engine results page (compared to 23% on a desktop), while only 11% looked beyond the second page.

In light of these illuminating statistics, now may be the perfect time to ask yourself if your website is fully optimised for the mobile web, and if not, what you can do about it.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Jon Celeste .