Do you need responsive design?<\/b><\/p>\n
I will explain below why responsive design is a must for every modern website or online business but as Joshua Steimle<\/a><\/b> mentioned in a Forbes article<\/a><\/b>: Getting a responsive website should be your number one online goal unless you don\u2019t depend on your website to stay in business or you have no competitors<\/i>.<\/p>\n Many people tend to confuse a mobile friendly website with a responsive website but that\u2019s not exactly the same. A mobile friendly website looks good on mobile devices but may not look so good on devices with bigger resolutions.<\/p>\n In the majority of the cases, there is the desktop version of a website and then there are dedicated pages (usually on an m.subdomain) optimized for mobile which are different from those shown on the desktop.<\/p>\n While these websites look good on the desktop and mobile, if you view them on other resolutions the user experience is not so good.<\/p>\n With responsive websites there is only one set of pages (and one set of code) for a website and what is changing is the way those pages adapt in the different devices.<\/p>\n Let me give you a couple of examples to understand the difference of having a mobile friendly website and a responsive website:<\/p>\n 1)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 WebMd.com<\/p>\n Webmd has a mobile friendly version but not a responsive website. Click on the images below to see that it looks great on the desktop and mobile but not so good when you view it on a different resolution.<\/p>\n 2)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 techcrunch.com<\/p>\n TechCrunch has a responsive website. Click on the images below to see how beautiful it adapts to all sizes and resolutions.<\/p>\n The easiest way to tell if a website is responsive is to change your browser width and see how it looks. If the design adapts well and the website still looks good then it is responsive. You can of course use online tools like this one<\/a> that can help you test your websites on different devices\/resolutions.<\/p>\n Is a responsive website the same as the native apps you can install on your iPhone or android?<\/b><\/p>\n Please note a mobile friendly version is not the same as native apps that can be installed on Android and iPhones. If you are not sure about the difference read this article: mobile website vs native app<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n So now that is clear what a responsive website is and what it is not, let\u2019s see what are the advantages of having a responsive website for your business and how to justify the investment needed to turn your non-responsive website into responsive.<\/p>\n There are many studies that came out since early last year (2013) showing the dramatic rise in the number of people who use their mobiles and tablets for all their online activities (social networking, shopping, researching, searching google etc).<\/p>\n Two of these studies are published by Google (here<\/a><\/b> and here<\/a><\/b>) with some very interesting findings, the most important are noted below and summarized in this custom infographic<\/a><\/b>:<\/p>\n What does this mean for businesses?<\/b> If you don\u2019t offer your users or potential customers a good experience on the device of their choice, you may lose visitors or customers. On the other hand, if you make sure that the experience they will have on the various devices is good, you are more likely to retain them as visitors and later convert them to customers.<\/p>\n Most probably if you check your analytics, you will find out that already 10% \u2013 30% of your visitors are coming from mobile\/tablets and if you are not offering them a user friendly version you are losing customers.<\/p>\n So, the added advantage of going responsive is that it will enable you to keep in touch with your customers and engage with them on every possible occasion.<\/p>\n As mentioned above, the beauty of having a responsive website versus a mobile friendly version is that you only need to maintain one set of code, one set of pages for your website so any changes or new functionality you offer to the desktop version are automatically available on mobile as well.<\/p>\n There has been a long discussion in the SEO industry about responsive website and SEO. Some people say that it\u2019s good for SEO<\/a><\/b>, others believe<\/a><\/b> that a responsive website is not the best solution for all businesses while Google is saying that having a responsive website is the recommended configuration<\/a><\/b> for creating smartphone optimized websites.<\/p>\n In my opinion a responsive web site is good for SEO<\/b> because:<\/p>\n By going from a mobile friendly version to a responsive website you are more likely to increase conversions or earnings from ads.<\/p>\n Migrating 3 AdSense websites to responsive design resulted in 20-30% increase in AdSense earnings compared to mobile friendly versions.<\/p>\n Details of these case studies will be published in the next few weeks (so stay tuned) but the increase in AdSense is a clear indication that responsive websites increase conversions as well.<\/p>\n Data from our clients who are selling products online, support the above statement and this is also something we will publish with more details soon.<\/p>\n In the meantime, you can also read how these 14 brands increased their conversion rates by going responsive<\/a>.<\/b><\/p>\n It\u2019s becoming an industry standard so by staying in synch you are a step closer to your competitors (or ahead if they are not following a responsive design).<\/p>\n The future of the web is mobile and it is estimated that by 2017 more than 5 billion people<\/a><\/b> will use mobile phones. These are numbers and figures you cannot ignore and if you are not convinced that a responsive website can help your business now, it will certainly do in the next few years.<\/p>\n A responsive website can help you maintain a consistent design across devices rather than serving your users with a different set of pages for each type of device that may have a different look’n’feel.<\/p>\n It is not the purpose of this article to go into the technical details on how to make a responsive website but I can give you some guidelines and examples on what we have done for other clients.<\/p>\n Websites can be designed responsive from the beginning or can be converted into responsive later.<\/p>\n There are 2 ways to make a responsive website:<\/p>\n 1)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Use a responsive theme \u2013 if you are using wordpress there are a number of ready-made themes that are also responsive so you can buy one out of the shelf and use it.<\/p>\n 2)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Transform your existing website and theme into responsive design.<\/p>\n 3)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Create a custom design from scratch that it\u2019s also responsive.<\/p>\n We have converted many non-responsive websites to responsive, some examples are shown below:<\/p>\n The nice thing about migrating from non-responsive to responsive is that the desktop version stays the same. The look n feel of the desktop website does not change in any way<\/b> so you don\u2019t have to worry that a responsive design will break your website\u2019s theme.<\/p>\n So far and from our experience it is possible for almost any type of website (especially wordpress websites) to be made responsive.<\/p>\n If you planning to use a pre-made responsive theme then the difference in price compared to non-responsive themes is not important.<\/p>\n If you are designing your website from scratch then the responsive design may cost you 10% more than a non-responsive website (of course this depends on the actual design).<\/p>\n If you want to migrate your existing website to responsive then this may cost from a few hundreds to a few thousand dollars depending on the complexity and setup of your website.<\/p>\nWhat is the difference between a mobile website and a responsive website?<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.reliablesoft.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/webmd-desktop-150x150.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.reliablesoft.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/webmd-mobile-150x150.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.reliablesoft.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/webmd-ipad-150x150.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.reliablesoft.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/techcrunch-desktop-150x150.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.reliablesoft.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/techcrunch-mobile-150x150.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.reliablesoft.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/techcrunch-responsive-150x150.jpg\")
<\/a>Advantages of responsive design for website owners<\/h2>\n
1)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Reach more audience<\/h3>\n
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2)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Your customers are already mobile, stay in touch with them<\/h3>\n
3)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 You have one website to maintain and one set of code<\/h3>\n
4)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 SEO benefits from responsive design<\/h3>\n
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5)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Increase conversions and earnings from ads<\/h3>\n
6)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Stay in front of the competition<\/h3>\n
7)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 You are preparing now for the future<\/h3>\n
8)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Offer a consistent design across all devices<\/h3>\n
How can you make a website responsive?<\/h2>\n
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How much does it cost?<\/h2>\n