A Responsive Web Design is the one that adjusts itself according to the size of the device it is viewed on by users, making it easy for them to view the site without going back and forth or pinching on the screen to view a certain element. Responsive web designs (RWD) are coded by web designers using concepts such as media queries to align navigation elements, videos, audios and images according to multiple screen layouts.
The ever increasing use of mobiles has made responsive web design a core component of web designer’s arsenal today. Google too released a responsive algorithm “mobilegeddon” finally noticing the importance of RWD in spring last year, to reward mobile-friendly websites in its search results. Even though the update is in its early stages, it will become a driving force behind the search rankings over time. Just after the release of Mobilegeddon, many business owners moved to the responsive version of their desktop site.
Mobile version sub-site
This is also called adaptive web design and load separately as a mobile sub type. There are many examples for these kind of sites, like casino.com for instance. It has a mobile version sub-site which you can find here. The content is more mobile compatible and the pages loads quicker so everyone wins.
It’s good at ranking well in mobile page search results with mobile friendly in front of every search results.
Benefits of Responsive Web Design
Flexible Layouts:
The responsive site designs are flexible, making it easy for the content to move and adjust to different screen resolutions accordingly. The images and grids used are fluid to allow content for filling an allotted space, maintaining its appearance across the different device screens.
Optimal User Experience
The primary objective behind the creation of any site is the best user experience. A site with a bad UX results in a decreased user engagement. The responsive web design counters this, offering an optimal user experience, enhancing site’s performance at the same time.
Affordable Solution
Instead of having two separate sites, one catering to the desktop screens and other to the smartphone screens, you can make your desktop site responsive by implementing media queries with frameworks such as Bootstrap and Foundation. You neither have to pay nor maintain two separate sites, which is an affordable solution for your site.
Helps to Get Around Duplicate ContentSearch engines can’t differentiate between two different URLs of the same site, unless specified exclusively. A separate mobile site having the same images and content will be considered duplicate to hurt your rankings. Avoid this through RWD.
Social Share Growth
You can share just one link of your site socially, targeting your audience through one link without worrying about the device they are going to use. Also, this makes it easy for users to remember one URL to your site, instead of typing in mobile and desktop URLs separately for accessing it.
Less On-Page SEO Overhead
The on-page SEO elements such as titles, Meta descriptions, sitemaps, 301 redirects etc, are cut short with a responsive design. You just have to implement them once, instead of worrying about optimizing the mobile site too.
In short, a responsive web design rescues you from additional workload and cost, while keeping the user experience optimal with search engine optimization benefits. Go responsive now to start enjoying all the above mentioned benefits that the RWD has to offer.
