Why is it necessary to have mobile-friendly websites?
Mobile devices accounted for 61% of Google searches. As a result, more than half of people now use mobile devices instead of desktop computers, thus your website must be optimised to work on all screen sizes if you want to stay competitive. Your users will have a better user experience and be able to discover what they need while on the go with a mobile-friendly design.
Here are some suggestions for making your WordPress website mobile-friendly:
⦁ Use a WordPress Responsive Theme
On a desktop, your website may look beautiful and be responsive. However, if you do not utilise a responsive theme, your website will fail to impress viewers on numerous displays since the material or photos you have used will not be adequately viewable.
There is no need to host a custom mobile website alongside your standard desktop site if you use a responsive mobile-friendly theme. On any device, a responsive website has the same material, photos, and information, but it adjusts the way it is displayed and structured according on the size of the device screen.
As a result, using a mobile-friendly theme is the ideal way to make your website mobile-friendly because you are not restricting information to mobile visitors.
Aside from that, there are other options. WordPress has a number of plugins for creating mobile versions of your site, including:
WordPress Mobile Pack, WPTouch, WP Mobile Edition, Jetpack, Any Mobile Theme Switcher.
In contrast to responsive themes, these frequently have boilerplate design and few customization options. Overall, I would always advise using a responsive theme.
2. Make use of mobile-optimized plugins
Plugins are fantastic and necessary additions to any WordPress website. They improve the functionality and features of your website. This ensures that everything functions properly on mobile devices as well. However, plugins can also add a physical element to your website, such as a widget or a Call-to-Action button, making it more functional. It scales well across all screen sizes, and Atlas allows you to disable it on smaller screens.
3. Avoid Using Flash
Using flash on your website will slow it down and have an impact on SEO. It can slow down website loading times and is incompatible with many browsers and devices. However, because mobile devices do not support flash, it does not work well.
Flash is not supported by Android or iOS devices. As a result, if you create a website with Flash animation, your mobile consumers will be excluded. Though flash technology is becoming obsolete, it is time to learn about its replacements and be safe. However, HTML is recommended because it is new and widely utilised by designers and developers.
4. Avoid Using Pop-Ups On Mobile Devices
If you want to build an email list using your WordPress website, I'm guessing you have a range of opt-ins. Many of the email opt-in forms are fully functional on mobile devices.
Pop-ups, on the other hand, are a distinct beast. Google has begun to penalise pop-ups and other forms of opt-in that a user must dismiss before accessing the page's content.
Avoid pop-ups on your mobile design to maintain your WordPress site mobile-friendly and best practises compliant.
5. Make Use of Optimized Images
If your website has too many images, it will take too long to load due to the big size of the images. This may annoy your mobile users.
According to Google, more than 53% of people abandon websites that take more than 3 seconds to load. As a result, if your website takes more than 3 seconds to load, 50% of your visitors will abandon it.
This three-second window can make or break your website's first impression for new visitors.
As a result, anytime you upload photos on your website, it is critical to understand how long it takes for your website to load.
Optimizing photos and subsequently placing them on your website will not improve page load time. As a result, image optimization is a vital step you should take to ensure your website is fast for mobile users.
If you are already using the latest version of WordPress and want to ensure that your photos are effectively optimised, you might consider using the Smush Image Compression and Optimization plugin to optimise your images for mobile users.
6. Make use of Google's Mobile-Friendly Testing Tool.
Google has released its Mobile-Friendly Test Tool, which determines whether or not your WordPress website is mobile-friendly. What more is required to make your site mobile-friendly?
Popular search engines are cracking down on mobile-unfriendly websites. As a result, you should utilise Google's Mobile-Friendly Test Tool to optimise your WordPress website for mobile users.
This tool can assist you in determining what your website is lacking. As a result, you can immediately identify performance issues with your website.
Simply enter your website's URL into the test tool website to get an instant assessment of your site's mobile design.
Conclusion
We live in an increasingly mobile-dominated world that cannot be avoided. As mobile devices are preferred methods of browsing any website. As a result, in today's Internet age, mobile-friendliness is a must-have element for any website.
Both your audience and search engines expect it from modern websites. As a result, website owners and developers must educate themselves on how to make their WordPress websites mobile-friendly.
On the other hand, as a well-known WordPress development business, we have compiled a list of the most crucial aspects to consider while making your website mobile-friendly. They include responsive design, mobile-optimized plugins and pictures, site speed, avoiding full-screen popups, and mobile site administration. Please contact us if you have any questions.
