Mobile-friendly Website

The Easy Way To Make A Mobile Friendly Website

As mobile devices are more and more sophisticated, people start shifting their browsing preferences from desktop and laptop computers to smartphones and tablets. The more these users migrate towards mobile devices, the more webmasters need to develop mobile friendly websites. Google now has two different algorithms, one for desktop and one for mobile. If your website is not optimized for both search engines, your business may fall back in the rankings. Here is some a little background on mobile friendly websites to optimize your site for search engine optimization.

A few years ago, the most common solution to this problem was to develop two different versions of the same website, one for computers and one for smartphones. This method worked pretty well, but it was cumbersome for web developers and expensive for website owners who had to pay twice for the coding of their websites.

Image of grid design used for mobile responsive websites

Website Fluid Grid

All these problems came to an end once responsive web design was invented. This programming technique is based on a fluid grid which allows pages to adapt to the screen size and resolution, as well as to the type of device it is viewed on. These media queries make all the difference. You program your site according to the “mobile first” principle, the advantage being that web pages become much smaller, and therefore much faster, when loaded on a mobile, rather than a regular computer.

Besides, as there are no more fixed sizes, no inches and no pixels, everything is calculated in percentages of the screen width. This allows for a harmonious design regardless the shape and the size of the screen the website is viewed on. The only thing you have to worry about is to define the limits properly. You have to know the size of an iPhone, iPad or of older smartphones, so that you can set the boundaries that trigger layout changes.

Image of devices that will display a mobile responsive website

Mobile Responsive Devices

The easiest way to develop a mobile friendly website is by choosing the responsive web design technique. There are many CSS3 and HTML layouts, as well as WordPress and Joomla themes that integrate this method. Some of them are even free of charge, so you can have a professionally looking, responsive website in as little as a couple of hours.

If you need a custom layout, you can use one of the open source grids that are available. Twitter Bootstrap and LESS are two of the most popular ones. They are great because they have lots of predefined design elements, so you can easily add a new button, a call to action or a hero unit on any of your pages. You don’t even need to know much coding to create a good looking and perfectly functional website that adapts to the viewing device.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/coolbuddyzeshan/18368154701/in/photostream/

Even the default WordPress themes are responsive today, so you can choose any of them, if all you are interested in is a clean website that adapts to mobiles automatically, while still looking great on the large screens of desktop computers and on laptops of all sizes and shapes.

If you already have a website, but you don’t want to redo it in order to become mobile friendly, you can find and install a plugin that does this for you. It may not be the perfect solution, but it can save you from trouble, at least until you figure out a better way.

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