Wondering if You Need a Mobile Website? Some Things to Consider…

By • Mar 24th, 2011 • Category: technology

mobile websiteAs more and more folks get comfy with using mobile devices to consume web content, more and more entrepreneurs are left to wonder if and how they should be exploring this space. Real life examples are always the best teachers so …

The other day I got what you might call a “support question” from my friend Linda Dessau of Content Mastery Guide. Linda is a writing coach and was using my Sales Page Relief copywriting system to revamp one of her sites and wanted some insight on the following:

“If my site is displaying okay (at least on my own mobile device), is there any reason to do a mobi site?”

Here’s my (unedited) response:

“A true mobile site is generally a lot more user friendly on a mobile device. (There are some screen shots of mobile-style promotions I researched and put into the Appendix [of Sales Page Relief] if you want an idea of how they work a little differently than ‘normal’ full sites.)

For example, my main snapwebmarketing.com site looks ‘okay’ on a mobile device, but it’s probably quite hard to read and navigate versus a true mobile site. Mobile design is easier to navigate and read and generally only contains the must-have info without too many extra graphics/extraneous info/that kind of thing.

BUT, don’t dive into mobile marketing unless you have good reason to do so. Or at minimum, keep your investment low and manageable until the numbers/results justify something more involved.

That said, there are some plugins out there now for WordPress that are supposed to make it fairly easy to play around with creating a mobile version of any WP site. So you might want to start there and see how it comes out. AND if you check your Google Analytics (or other analytics program) you can often get stats that show how many visitors are ACTUALLY reading your content via mobile … it might only be a small percentage and then you have to decide if it’s worth testing or not based on your audience need/user habits/etc.”

Her response to my response:

Excellent answer that would make a great blog post ;)

Thanks!
Linda

P.S. I don’t use WordPress…

To which I replied:

Hey – good idea!! I might do that!

PS – Not sure this will help you but check it out: http://plugins.movabletype.org/mid-century-mobile/

No doubt the mobile question often leads to the ever annoying “it depends” type of answer. But it’s a fact of life in business that to explore new markets is to be okay with acting on an educated guess–or a series of such guesses.

While I’m no mobile guru (is anyone really … yet?), I think I can lend some objectivity and clarity around how to navigate such uncharted waters, at least from a general marketing perspective. So here are 3 questions to help you come up with a “best guess” and in turn, a productive course of action should you decide to try on a mobile face:

1) Is enough of my audience using mobile already to justify testing? Your analytics program can tell you how many people are viewing your content with a mobile device, including that number as a percentage of your traffic. Even a small percentage might indicate pent up demand for more mobile content. Also consider audience psychographics and demographics and whether or not your audience would actually consume more of your content if it were mobile friendly.

2) Which content do I want to take mobile? This is an easy one if you only operate one website or domain, but many of us have multiple websites or promotional offers under different brands. For example, maybe you’ll test a mobile-friendly sales page or mini site for a single offer. Or you might want to just give your main site a mobile viewing option and go from there. You may also find you want to adapt your content for small-screen consumption. (Shameless plug: a mobile copywriting template is included in Sales Page Relief.)

3) How much time and money am I willing to invest–and risk–for my mobile market? Put another way: is a utilitarian mobile experience enough to get you started? Or do you want to create a rich brand experience that’s on par with its full site equivalent, or better? Increasingly, you have options here.  Sometimes, more sophistication means more expense. Not always, but buyer beware.

I’ve spent some time playing around with mobile WordPress plugins, just to see how simple (or hard) it really is to create a mobile alternative. I’ll fill you in on my findings in my next post. In the meantime, I’d love to know where you’re at with your own mobile explorations. Have you tried it yet? If so, what were the results? Are you thinking about it but aren’t sure where to start?

We’re all learning as we go here. So please feel free to share in the Comments!

  • http://twitter.com/bigbrightbulb Crys Williams

    What a nice read, thank you! These are important questions, and I agree that with simple (and maybe even free) plugins, like WPTouch for WordPress, it’s easy enough to implement a mobile-friendly site. Bonus points if the plugin allows customization.

    For a content-rich site, though, like a consultant’s blog, I’d skip these questions if Thinking gets in the way of Going. When using a tried-and-tested plugin, there’s little investment and potential for a nice return. In this case, it’s safe to Do and then Think—which is something I rarely ever say!—so just get it done.

    But for an e-commerce site that would require a redesign of not just their layout, but also their shopping cart? Definitely lots of thoughtful research required.

  • http://snapwebmarketing.com Karri Flatla

    Yes! When testing something new — but especially new, shiny and complicated — starting simple is key. Else it’s a hair-pulling thing that either discourages one from even bothering or causes one to spend too much on outsourcing before the concept has any traction.

    Thanks so much for weighing in Crys!