6/24/2010
Prepare Your Business for Mobile Search – Part 1
Trends in Mobile Phone Use for Internet Access
Internet access via mobile phone is growing by virtual leaps and bounds (pun intended). Any business that hopes to stay on the leading edge of its market ignores this rapidly expanding market segment to its own detriment.
In Smartphone Sales Jump 50 Percent, Mobiledia had this to say in early May:
“Smartphone shipments surged 50 percent in the first quarter from a year ago, notching up the strongest growth in several years with Apple and Nokia taking market share. Research firm Strategy Analytics said 54 million smartphones were shipped in the period, making up 18 percent of the total handset market.”
What does that tell us? Three things:
1. The total handset market is over 5 times larger than the number of smartphones that were shipped during the past year, meaning that over a quarter of a billion mobile phones are currently in circulation.
2. More than 54 million of these are smartphones, which have increased Web browsing capabilities.
3. Smartphone use has shown consistent growth, and that growth is rapidly accelerating.
While smartphone use is markedly increasing (demonstrating a growing potential for more complex online transactions via mobile), the vast majority of people who access the Web via cell phone still do so on a regular, non-smartphone model. Therefore, while businesses will want to keep a close eye on the new vistas that widespread smartphone use will inevitably bring to mobile search and other types of mobile interaction with their websites, they’ll also want to be sure their sites can accommodate the huge segment of mobile users who don’t yet own smartphones.
Develop a Mobile Marketing Strategy
Part of your mobile marketing strategy will include preparing your website for mobile visitors. The reality is that until the majority of mobile users own smartphones, you’ll need to keep a few considerations in mind:
- Most Mobile devices have extremely small screens, which means less room for displaying search results, ads, and/or website content.
- Mobile phones have slower connection speeds than computers do.
Both of the above will clearly impact your search marketing – and overall marketing – strategy. One major effect these factors will have is to force you to prioritize the content you’ll display to those who visit your site. Another is that it will force you to rethink your SEO and SEM strategies, since mobile search has many limitations for the majority of users (mainly the non-smartphone segment – though even smartphone users’ search capabilities are somewhat less comprehensive than computer users’).
Create a Mobile Version of Your Website
While smartphone users should have no problem viewing your current website on their mobile phones, the overwhelming majority of cell phone users who have more basic, non-smartphone models won’t enjoy this luxury. Since you don’t want to exclude this huge segment of potential customers from readily accessing all the most important content on your website, you’ll need to design a simplified version of your site that these folks can visit while on the go.
The following are a few attributes of mobile websites:
- They have scaled-down design.
- They focus on speed.
- They use simplified navigation
- They use proportionately larger text for readability
To create the best experience for your mobile users, you’ll need to create a version of your website that includes each of the above characteristics. If necessary, you’d do well to outsource this function to an expert in the field.
Mobile Search: An Exciting Challenge
Mobile search presents an exciting challenge filled with nearly endless possibilities for forward-looking companies. That’s why businesspeople who want to be on the cutting edge of their market need to keep abreast of trends and make any changes required to keep up with the times.
In my next post, I’ll discuss the strategies you’ll need to implement to prepare your business for mobile search.
Image Credit: Google Mobile Ads http://www.google.com/mobileads/advertiser_home.html
