A website is a powerful tool for marketing a small business, and it's important to be mobile-optimised.

What does this mean? It means that when someone visits your site from their smartphone or tablet, they can see everything they need on the page without having to scroll sideways or zoom in and out. Mobile optimisation is important because most of us are using our smartphones more than any other device these days, over 51% of all searches done via Google are done on a mobile phone, 46% from a desktop computer and the remaining 3% on a tablet. The use of mobile phones is increasing year on year, back in 2015 mobile browsing was just 32%.

View more stats here - https://www.statista.com/statistics/277125/share-of-website-traffic-coming-from-mobile-devices/

What does mobile-optimisation mean for a small business website

Mobile-optimised sites are designed to be easy for users to peruse, read, and interact with from a mobile device such as a tablet or smartphone. A mobile-optimised site is typically lighter in design and contains less image heavy content than its traditional desktop counterpart. The layout shifts depending on the user's screen orientation - horizontal scrolling is used if the device is held in landscape mode, vertical scrolling if it is held in portrait mode.

Mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones have become highly popular amongst consumers who are using them not just for browsing the internet, but also to access many of their other needs. Mobile devices are often the first place that potential customers will learn about your business or website, whether that is via a search engine, or social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.

Mobile devices have become integral to everyday life, they are a mini-computer in your pocket, and with this in mind, information is readily available wherever and whenever it is needed.

Why is it important to be mobile-optimised

It's necessary for small businesses to ensure that their websites are mobile-optimised. The vast majority of people browsing the internet now do so on a mobile device, and if your site isn't optimised for this type of browsing, you're missing out on potential customers.

Mobile devices have made significant improvements in recent years which have made it possible for people to do more things online from them while using less data. With the ability to look up any information online from your device which sits neatly in your pocket is an extremely powerful thing, as a business owner you have the opportunity to always be able to display your services and products at the touch of a smartphone button!

How can you tell if your site is mobile optimised

The easiest way to tell if you site is mobile friendly is to open it up on your mobile phone's browser and take a look, things to look for include:

1) You should always make sure you aren't connected to a Wifi network at the time, rather you should use your phone's 4g or 5g connection. This will enable you to get a more accurate understanding of the page load speeds, if you are connected to your Wifi it will be using your broadband connection speed rather than the mobile data.

2) Check that your navigation works correctly, usually you will see the standard desktop navigation bar replaced with what is called "the hamburger menu", when clicked this will open up a list of your site pages.

3) Does your website scroll sideways? If so then it is a strong indicator that your design isn't built entirely for mobile use. Content which is wider than your screen can make it difficult for site visitors to use your website effectively.

4) Can you click on your links and buttons easily? You should be able to click any hyperlinks or buttons on your pages easily without accidentally hitting other clickable items nearby. If they are too close together it could make navigating your website extremely difficult on mobile devices.

Check mobile design using your desktop computer

If for some reason you don't have a mobile device to hand, you can easily perform the same checks above using your desktop computer. The way you do this is to resize your browser window manually by minimising the window and manually dragging the corner to resize it, in an ideal world you should see your website design changing as you do this, depending on the browser window's "viewport".

Drag your window to roughly the same size and orientation that you would expect from a mobile phone screen and check for issues.

Use Google's tools to tell you

Google has specific tools which help web designers and site owners understand if their website is mobile friendly. The first is their "Google Page Speed Insights" tool found here - https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/.

Google Page Insights is primarily intended to help identify areas of your website which are slow to load on both Mobile and Desktop devices. It will provide you with some feedback on what improvements should be made to gain a better performance on mobiles.

However this tool can be quite technical in what it suggests, you need to have some knowledge of coding and technologies behind websites and web servers to really gain the most out of it.

The second tool is Google Search Console, this like the previous tool provides feedback on how your website performs on mobiles. It gives you average load speeds on a page by page basis but also has a "Mobile Usability" section providing feedback on design elements, text too small to read, clickable items too close together etc...

How do you make your site mobile optimised

There are two main strategies in making your website mobile friendly:

The first (and oldest) is to design two separate versions of your website and have the browser display the correct version depending on which device you are using to view the site. This essentially duplicates your entire website, producing two different versions, this can cause issues when it comes to SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) where the search engines such as Google may index multiple versions of your website. A line of code is added to your website to detect the browser window (or viewport) dimensions and display the correct version of your website.

The second and by far the most common and accepted method is to design a "responsive" website. This is where your website design automatically resizes itself or "responds" to the size of the viewport or browser window. This is done using something called CSS (cascading style sheets). CSS is a separate coding language which is only used to determine the look and feel of your website, it has nothing to do with the actual physical content (wording, images, video etc..).

With CSS you can define a set of rules for font size, colour, pixel dimensions etc... for any element of your website's design. Through CSS you can set specific rules out for desktop machines, tablets and mobile phones. Because CSS is separate from your site content there is no need to create two separate versions of your pages as in the previous method. CSS would use the same page content and simply display it differently for each device.

Modern CMS's should be mobile optimised

Most modern websites are based upon a CMS (content management system) such as WordPress, WIX or DUDA. These are basically a framework for building your website upon and have a range of different "themes" which can be applied as a basis of your website's design. Newer themes are more often than not always mobile friendly.

Problems occur when websites are built using an old theme, a bespoke theme or out-dated theme. If you are using a CMS for your website it is advisable that you ensure all relevant updates are performed to the CMS software to ensure that your website is mobile friendly.

Hand Coded websites or those not based around a CMS can also cause issues depending on the age of your site or when it was put together, these would require significantly more work to fix any mobile design issues.

Conclusion

In the modern age of mobile browsing and social media, it is vital that as a small business your website is as accessible on mobile devices as possible. Over half of all website visitors use a mobile device these days. Ensuring that your website performs well for mobiles is key to online success, from a fast loading website on 4g & 5g to a design suited for the smaller screen sizes.

Making your website mobile-optimised can be quite daunting, especially if you aren't a web designer. If you are experiencing issues with your website on mobiles and want to ensure you are reaching those potential customers using a mobile device, seeking the help of a professional may be an option you should consider.