It’s Official: It’s Time to Get Mobile

The talk at Inman Connect on Day One was all about mobile. These fun facts were uncovered early:

• 2/3 of Zillow visits are mobile (70% on weekends)
• Less than 50% of agent landing pages are optimized for mobile
• In 2014, more time was spent on mobile than the rest of the internet combined

Since we are all about helping our clients innovate to become more successful, we thought we'd throw out some simple ways you can optimize your company's website for this ever-growing mobile market.

Here are four tricks of the trade to get you started:

• Mobile friendly and mobile optimization are not the same thing: When you optimize your site for mobile, you are essentially creating a second site. Mobile versions are simpler to navigate, have larger buttons, less flash, and shorter copy. This isn't the same as mobile friendly. Mobile friendly simply means your site appears correctly and in proportion on numerous platforms. You want a site that looks, acts and behaves differently when it's mobile. That will create the best experience for the consumer.
• Give consumers the option of going to your main site: As you develop your optimized site, make sure to keep the option for the user to revert back to the full site. If they are familiar with your full site, they might prefer its navigation. Give them the option for both, and make sure if they do go to the full site, it is mobile friendly.
• Keep it super simple: As you are developing your mobile site, make sure it's simple. Boil down the content of your website to the information people most often search for and display it in a way that's easy to find and read. Remember, on mobile, you're competing with a never-ending stream of text messages, e-mails, and even the occasional phone call. Keep it simple so the visitor can find what they want quickly and move onto the next thing in their day.
• Consider investing in UI / UX help: First a quick definition: UI = user interface, which essentially is the layout of your site. Things like where the search bar is placed and when to display a picture is all UI. UX = user experience, which essentially is how a user interacts with your site. Whether they swipe or push a button to navigate you site is all UX. People go to school and become experts in UI / UX because it's important. If you are investing in mobile optimization, consider hiring a company or individual that is well versed in mobile UI / UX. You'll get more from your investment.

Congratulations. If you're reading this, you are seriously considering creating a mobile version of your website. This is where the future is. Remember these four points to get you started and good luck. If you happen to be an Onboard client, all of our local and property information is compatible with any mobile design you create.

If you would like to learn more on what information is available for your mobile site, contact us today.

To view the original article, visit the Onboard Informatics blog.