By now, you've likely heard of the importance of a mobile-friendly website. We've published a few blog posts about it here as well. However, just because you have a mobile-friendly website doesn't mean the experience is perfect.
There are several factors that play an important role in a mobile-friendly website, one of which is site speed. As we've discussed before, website speed can impact a number of things about your website, including user experience. Slow site speed is one of the main reasons why people leave a website, resulting in higher bounce rates. According to a recent Google article, we now know the negative effects of slow site speed can be long-lasting: "People who have a negative experience on a mobile website are 62% less likely to purchase from that brand in the future than if they have a positive experience."
Mobile site speed is key to making sure your user has a positive experience. If your mobile site takes too long to load, you are likely to see a high user drop off. This stat from the same Google article is staggering: "In retail, we see that a one-second delay in mobile load times can impact conversions by up to 20%." Imagine standing in your brick-and-mortar store and watching 20% of your customers walk out immediately because they couldn't get far in your store. Yikes!
Optimizing your mobile website goes beyond just site speed. Here are a few other key items to look for:
- Make sure the text is readable on a mobile device. If users ave to zoom in to read content, they likely won't have a good experience.
- Make sure clickable elements aren't too close together. "Fat finger syndrome" is a real struggle.
- While visual elements are great to have, it shouldn't take more than a few scrolls to get to the main conent of your mobile site. If it does, you may be losing visitors.
The important thing to remember is that just because something looks great on a desktop does not mean it will play nice on a mobile device. Always make sure you're developing your mobile strategy with mobile users in mind.
