Did Your Web Design Agency Forget to Make Your Site Mobile?

Phillip Mauracher • Mar 09, 2024

Key Points to Ensure Your Website is Mobile-Friendly

Cat using a website on a mobile phone, ready to buy a toy.

Have you ever been on your phone and visited a website only to find it was so tiny you couldn't read it, or the site was just unusable on a phone.  If you're like me, I can't stand that and I'll just leave the site.  Why in the heck would any web design agency let that happen? We've had mobile browsing for almost 20 years now!  That is where Studio 1585 comes in. We can help get your website in order and make it mobile friendly, or we can help your designers out too.


Having a mobile-friendly website is not just a luxury, it's a necessity. With over 58% of global internet traffic coming from mobile devices in 2022, it's clear that people are increasingly relying on their smartphones and tablets to browse the web. So, if your website isn't optimized for these smaller screens, you are missing out on a huge chunk of potential traffic, customers, and revenue. To help you out, here's a guide to making sure your website is ready for the mobile era.



Responsive Design is Your Best Friend

A responsive website automatically adjusts its layout and content to fit the screen size of the device it's being viewed on. This means your site will look great and function well whether someone is browsing on a desktop, a tablet, or a smartphone. It's like having a website that's a master of disguise, seamlessly blending into any environment! It's critical that you ask your web designer to make sure your site is mobile first. The days of pixel perfect went out like last year's Easter bonnet.



Speed is Key

Mobile users are an impatient bunch. In fact,  more than 53% of mobile site visits are abandoned if a page takes longer than three seconds to load. Yes, your visitors have the attention spans of children. But time is money.  Who wants to stick around for a site to take forever to load, sucking up all that sweet sweet bandwidth? To keep your visitors happy and engaged, make sure your website loads rapidly. A tool such at Google PageSpeed Insights can help you measure this.

You can make your mobile site load faster by minimizing use of bloated frameworks, optimizing images, minifying code, and using a content delivery networks (CDN) to speed up delivery.  (By the way, Studio 1585 practices what we preach.  No bloat or gigantic images here!)



Simplicity is Sophistication

When it comes to mobile design, less is more. A cluttered, complicated layout can be overwhelming on a small screen. Keep your design clean, simple, and easy to navigate. Use larger, clear buttons, and make sure there's enough space between interactive elements to avoid any accidental taps.



Readable Fonts Are a Must

Squinting is never a good look, especially when trying to read tiny text on a mobile screen. Make sure your website uses legible fonts that are large enough to be easily read without zooming. Aim for a minimum font size of 16px for body text.



Optimize Your Images

Large, high-resolution images might look stunning on a desktop, but they can slow down your mobile site and eat up data. Optimize your images for mobile by compressing them, using the appropriate file format (like WebP) to reduce file size without sacrificing quality, and lazy loading. Tools such as Photoshop, Gimp, and other can help. Studio 1585 is here to help you resize and optimize those files! YAAS!



Make It Zoomable
While zooming in on a mobile website can sometimes feel like a game of "Where's Waldo?" it's important to ensure your site can be zoomed up to 200% without losing functionality. This not only helps users with visual impairments but also makes it easier for everyone to see your content clearly.



The Call to Action Prompts Must Be at the Top
Your call-to-action (CTA) buttons are like the superheroes of your website, guiding visitors towards your desired action. Make sure these are prominently placed at the top of your mobile site, so users don't have to scroll endlessly to find them. After all, you wouldn't hide a superhero in the basement, would you? (Don't answer that.)



Easy Navigation is Crucial

A mobile-friendly website should have a navigation menu that's easy to use with one hand. Consider using a hamburger menu (those three little lines that open up a menu) to save space and keep your site looking tidy. Also, ensure that your most important pages are easily accessible from the main menu.



Test, Test, and Test Again
What works well on one device might not work on another. Test your website on various devices and browsers to ensure a consistent and user-friendly experience. Tools like Google's Mobile-Friendly Test can also help you identify any issues that need fixing. Ask your friends and family to look. Don't let that one problem on that one device be the thing that drives all those visitors away.



In conclusion, making sure your website is mobile-friendly is paramount. You'll not only improve the user experience for mobile visitors but also increase your chances of ranking higher in search engine results. Now go forth and give your website the mobile makeover it deserves! After all, in the words of the great Lily Tomlin, "The road to success is always under construction."





Studio 1585 can help you create a responsive that looks amazing on desktop, tablet, and mobile. Contact us to schedule a free consultation today!

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