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The Importance of Having a Mobile-Friendly Website

The world is going mobile and that’s not a trend that’s going to slow down any time soon. In fact year over year, smartphones and tablets are greatly more in use than laptops and desktop computers. So what does all of this mean for your website? It means that it better be mobile-friendly.

Google is changing its algorithms all the time. Algorithms are the ranking factors Google uses to decide how they will rank websites and display them in search results when consumers look for certain search terms. And with Google being the most popular browser for the past several years, these algorithms are something website owners should take very seriously.
In April of 2015, Google responded to the increase of mobile devices by including an algorithm that placed a higher importance, or rank, on websites that were mobile-friendly. Being mobile-friendly means that a website will load quickly on a mobile device and that it will be able to be viewed properly.

This is important for website owners that are looking to get more traffic to their website, which is every website owner. If a site is not mobile-friendly, it will not get a good page ranking which means that it will be shown much lower in the search results than other websites that are mobile-friendly – such as competitor’s websites. Sites that are not mobile-friendly will lose traffic and ultimately, lose customers.

Customers are also likely to increase their engagement with a particular website when it’s mobile-friendly. Reports have shown that 90 percent of people will move between devices when using a website. This means that while they may search for a local business on their phone, they may move to their desktop when it’s time to contact that website or to look further into it. This doesn’t just result in repeat traffic, which is good for any website, but it also reduces the bounce rate of a website and makes customers more likely to spend more time, and more money, on that site’s products or services.

Customers have also been proven to be much more likely to make a purchase from a website when it’s mobile-friendly. This is because even if someone is at home, it’s likely that they’re looking for a business on their tablet or phone, not on their desktop computer. Small businesses will get even more out of a mobile website because customers are often likely to search for local businesses while they are out and about. When they find a business online, they are likely to visit it and even more likely to buy from that company. If a website isn’t mobile-friendly, the chances that the website will appear in the search results are slim which means those local customers won’t know about the business and will go somewhere else.

No one can deny that mobile is taking over the online world or that in coming years the use of mobile devices is likely to go up while desktop usage continues to decline. This is important for website owners because with Google now placing such a large importance on websites that are mobile-friendly, those that aren’t will continue to feel the effect in the amount of traffic they receive, and their ranking within the most popular search engine.