Mobile first design has been trending for some time now. Mobile phones are being used widely to unearth information due to its ease of use and convenience. Information is just one tap away when using mobile phones. When a user is accessing your website through his phone and doesn't be able to view information due to a broken or unattractive webpage then he is just one millisecond away to move to your competitor's page.  A Stat says that 61% of users do not return to a mobile site they had trouble accessing and 40% visit a competitor's site in such cases. 

Hence making a mobile friendly website is a necessity in today's time.

How to Make a Mobile-Friendly Website

Making a mobile friendly design is crucial for a business to not lose out on customers as a recent stat by CMS Report says "Average smartphone conversion rates are up 64% compared to the average desktop conversion rates."

Moreover a mobile friendly site are only ranked on the first few pages of Google so if your website isn't mobile friendly then it is sure shot that you will not see it in the first few pages of search engine ranking.

Related: 6 Ways Responsive Web Design Can Benefit your Business

So how do you make your website mobile friendly? 

1. Use fast and simple mobile app development tools to build a mobile friendly site

You can use Best Tools for building Apps Fast or conversion platforms like Mobilized or Duda Mobile to convert your website into an app rapidly without much coding.  

2. Using Mobile Plugins on CMS Platforms

With a lot of content management systems Platforms like WordPress, Joomla, Drupal etc. offer Mobile Plugins to convert your website efficiently. These platforms not only help you customize your mobile device, but also let you to easily incorporate other features required for mobile devices.

3. Redesign using Mobile Responsive Design

Once you have a mobile app running for time being, it is necessary to redesign your site responsively by keeping the mobile interface in mind. This is required to reconsider your content on what is required for mobile and desktop to create a consistent yet similar website for both mobile and desktop.

Mobile website design tips 

1. Keep one website for all devices

Try to keep just one website for all devices in common rather than designing one for movie and one for desktop. This will take a toll on your maintenance time and also increases maintenance cost. If you build just one website that is responsive then you will have a better user experience unmindful of the device that you use and also it eliminates the need for two websites. In just one URL your website is good to go and this reaps SEO benefits too.

2. Go Responsive 

Responsive website adjusts its content according to the screen layout and lets you to view content on different screens seamlessly. It reduces the development time considerably while creating a Responsive website development as you have to optimize just one website for responsiveness instead of creating different websites for different screens.

3. Always include a viewport meta tag

Viewport metadata is used to turn a static site into a responsive site.  

Before the advent of tablets and mobile phones, web pages were designed only for computer screens, and it was common for web pages to have a static design and a fixed size.

But now with various devices, the pages are designed to be responsive. 

The viewport is a virtual area used by the browser to determine how content is scaled and sized.  

4. Consider the thumb rule

Make sure your site is navigable easily and the user can navigate through it using his thumb without having to zoom into the page.

Font and button size of your screen elements are very important in your mobile devices. 

Keep your font bigger than 14pt and buttons very prominent. The bigger the button, the better navigation it takes.

5. Use YouTube videos

If your website contains a lot of videos, there are chances that your mobile site will have issues in playing the video and viewing it. Using YouTube videos provides the solution for any difficulties in viewing videos on mobile. This is made possible because the embed code on YouTube is already responsive which saves you from the hassle of optimizing your videos for mobile site.

Responsive vs. Adaptive Web Design 

Website

Adaptive and responsive web design does the same job of adjusting the screen to mobile view but using completely different methods.

Responsive Web Design

Responsive Web Design provides a seamless display of a website, no matter what type of device the user is viewing it. It provide an optimal viewing experience by facilitating easy reading and navigation with minimum resizing, panning, and scrolling through the screen. In short there is just one layout in responsive design website that changes according to device screen size.

Adaptive Web Design

Adaptive web design is different from responsive design as it doesn't involve changes in one layout. Instead, it contains several distinct layouts for multiple screen sizes and the layout used depends on the screen it encounters. Separate layouts for mobile phones, tablets, and computers are made in advance and the site detects the type of device used and delivers the predefined layout accordingly. 

Comparison of Responsive and Adaptive Web Design

1. Responsive design is difficult to make than adaptive design:

Responsive design requires extra attention to the site's CSS and organization to make sure it functions well at any possible size and hence it is difficult to make and takes time to plan. On the other hand, for the adaptive design you just have to make few predefined layouts for pre-defined screens. 

2. Responsive design is more Flexible than adaptive design

Since adaptive design is designed keeping predefined screen layouts in mind, it cannot handle surprises and may tend to break. There might be more advancement in technology and a lot many types of screen sizes coming up making you move to responsive design sometime down the lane. Responsive design can handle surprise screen size as it is prepared for any layout due to its fluidic nature. Like they say "A stitch in time saves nine", Adaptive designs may need maintenance due to this reason whereas responsive designs do not require this. 

3. Responsive Sites Load Faster than adaptive sites

Since adaptive sites have a lot of predefined layouts to load and check, it has a lag in load time compared to responsive sites. Search engine ranks those websites that loads faster and you might lose out on ranking with your competitor due to this reason. Adaptive sites have to load all those extra layouts to display well whereas responsive websites have just one layout to load making it win in speed.

Free Responsive and Mobile Website Templates

Here are few best responsive templates which are handpicked for you from famous websites. These templates are absolutely free to download and use.

• WebWorld Corporate Flat Responsive Template

WebWorld Corporate Flat Responsive Template

This is a professional free corporate Flat Responsive web design template that you can download and use for any type of website. It has a good responsive and flat design layout with a good color scheme and good flow of elements. The clean and organized layout of this template makes it fit to any modern website design.

• Elegantic Free Responsive Retailer Template 

Elegantic Free Responsive Retailer Template

This Elegantic Free Responsive Retailer Template is another fully responsive and retina ready free website template. It is built with HTML5 and CSS3 to best suit your retail website needs. Its bold black and white layout makes you focus only on the information displayed rather than being carried away by graphics and distractions. This is a clean and simple website that can showcase your products effectively. 

• Classic Ion Free Responsive Template

Classic Ion Free Responsive Template

The Classic Ion Free Responsive Template is another elegant and responsive modern website. It uses a simple, flat layout with minimalistic design alongside Prominent CTA's and hero images. In short it contains all design trends that are prevailing now to design a modern website. 

• Startup Business Free Responsive Site Template

Startup Business Free Responsive Site Template

Startup Business Free Responsive Website Template is another responsive and versatile template for modern website requirements. Its clean layout with pleasant attractive colors makes it pleasing to the eyes of the user.  IF you are a startup then this template will best suit you to display your information pleasantly and effectively.

Best Examples of Mobile Website Design

Here are some mobile website design examples that will inspire you with its clean, simple and responsive layout.

• Abercrombie & Fitch

Abercrombie Fitch

Abercrombie & Fitch which is a clothing website takes the help of a monochromatic style, minimalistic design and solid red image to draw the user's eyes to the offers without distracting him with unnecessary elements or too much graphics.

Its simple homepage presents the user with clear options to begin shopping and navigate with ease

The product page is a clean page that allows you to easily find important details like the prominent "Add to Bag" button displayed in green. 

• Booking.com 

Booking.com

Booking.com is another effective website that gets right to the point on their homepage which allows the user to easily begin searching for a hotel or room in a locality. The contrasting background and big textboxes makes it mobile friendly and attractive.

Once you proceed further with your search, you are greeted with more friendly and consistent pages with a lot of information packed neatly.

• Texas Roadhouse 

Texas Roadhouse

Texas Roadhouse is an attractive website with high quality pictures of food that attracts the user to order from them. The prominent CTA enter your zip code encourages users to find the nearest location to visit them. The website is designed in such a way that it improves loading time and website performance by replacing carousels and banners with images and typography. 

• Klondike Bar

Klondike Bar

Klondike Bar's mobile website is attractive and pleasing to the eye. it  is designed in such a way to cut down on your search time by using a variety of calls-to-action on the home page . Their mobile website has simplified communication using Hamburger menus. 

They have displayed marketing videos in the site with the help of YouTube to make it responsive like we discussed earlier.

• Dove Men + Care 

Dove Men + Care

Dove Men + Care's mobile website focuses on simplicity and performance with its minimalistic design, clean layout and pleasant colors.  It has limited website navigation to minimal and uses high quality images to increase customer engagement and conversion rate. 

The product display is another notable aspect in the page.

It also uses large buttons that ensures the thumb rule of website tips that we discussed.

Mobile website Vs. Mobile Apps

What is a mobile website?

A mobile website is a website that isn't downloaded in the phone and is accessed using any mobile devices' like Web browser, like Safari on iOS and Chrome on Android. Users type a website's URL or click on a link from a mobile to visit a mobile website.

The main advantage of a mobile website is that the user can access the same elements of a regular website from a smartphone or tablet. This gives the users the freedom to be mobile and access information anywhere and anytime without having to neither download an app nor compromise on the user experience.

What is a mobile app?

On the other hand a mobile app is an application that has to be downloaded and installed in order to be used. This download typically happens from an app marketplace, like the Apple App Store or Android's Google Play store.

A mobile app has functions of mobile website but it has an added advantage of finding a long term place in the user's smartphone. Businesses can send push notifications to users accessing mobile app and see more conversion rates.

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