Since the rise of smartphones, tablets, smartwatches, and other smart devices, more people now prefer to shop online, browse through social media and the internet, and check their email with their mobile devices. If your small business has a website, you need to be prepared for visitors with a responsive website.

Unfortunately, there are still many small businesses that haven’t jumped on the responsive website band wagon. That means visitors who view their website on mobile may be seeing something very broken up, small and/or not easy to navigate. That results in visitors leaving quickly instead of fighting through the website’s non-responsive design.

Not having a responsive website is a big mistake. We want to share the 8 benefits of having a responsive website design, so you can stop making this mistake.

1. Responsive Websites Support Various Screen Resolutions

This is the most obvious. If a visitor visits your non-responsive website, they’ll get exactly what desktop viewers get… except it’s all small or jumbled due to the screen resolution difference. By having a fully responsive design, your website will automatically adapt to your visitor’s screen size by resizing the text, images, and other elements on your website. That means if visitors with mobile devices access your website, they will see the website content easier instead of having to scroll through a huge mess or zoom in and out to read anything.

2. Improved Conversion Rates

Creating a consistent user experience across all devices is the key to converting your visitors to customers. When visitors are deciding whether or not to purchase a product/service, they don’t want to be redirected to a device-specific website because the process often takes longer. Having just one website that is secure and clean for all devices makes users less likely to get frustrated or turn to a competitor.

3. Faster Load Time

A study conducted by Kissmetrics found:

• 40 percent of people leave a website that takes more than three seconds to load
• 73 percent of mobile internet users say that they’ve encountered a website that was too slow to load
• 47 percent of consumers expect a web page to load in two seconds or less

What this find’s is that if your website takes too long to load, they will leave. That’s why if a webpage that isn’t optimized for smartphones and tablets will take more time to load, which can frustrate potential customers. Ensuring that your responsive website uses modern performance techniques such as caching and responsive image display will help improve your website’s loading speed.

4. Lower Bounce Rates

A responsive and optimized mobile website provides a better user experience for your visitors. Therefore, it’s more likely they’ll stay on your website and explore longer. Alternatively, if your site is not optimized for a mobile experience, visitors are more likely to get frustrated and “bounce”.

(Recommended reading: Digital Marketing Metrics)

5. It Benefits Online Marketing

Online marketing is directly effected by mobile since most online activities- like reading content, opening emails, conducting searches, and interacting with businesses on social media- is done on mobile. And being a small business owner, you probably know the importance of reaching out to as many customers as possible. With a responsive website, you have a higher chance of reaching out to more people and attracting more potential leads. Adding a responsive design to your online presence will help you evaluate and optimize your online marketing efforts to better reach and serve your customers.

6. Users Get a Better Experience

Having a responsive design eliminates the frustration of not being able to see all of your website’s content on mobile devices. Your website now work consistently on device, no matter if it’s a desktop computer, tablet or smartphone. The improved user experience is likely to lead to higher conversion rates and lower bounce rates, meaning you’re generating more sales and website revenue.

7. Lower Website Maintenance Needs

Maintaining a separate website designed specifically for mobile requires additional testing and support. Having separate desktop and mobile sites also necessitates two content strategies, two completely different designs, and potentially two design teams. Responsive design’s “one size fits all” approach means less work for you as a small business owner. You’ll spend less time on maintenance, which gives you more time to focus on other important tasks, like marketing and content creation.

8. It Benefits Your Website’s SEO

Google and other search engines are going to favor websites that are optimized for people using mobile and smartphone devices. Since having a responsive design means your website loads faster, you have a lower bounce rate, and one consistent link (instead of two), you’ll have a better ranking on search engines.

The Future of Responsive Web Design

Responsive design will only become more complex due to the continuous advancements in the technology industry. Although it’s a good assumption to say we have the benefits of responsive web design figured out, we are probably just in the beginning stages of responsive design. Find

Finding solutions to reduce the costs of maintenance, optimize website’s for search engines, and improving conversion rates are some of the goals the future will focus on. Most recent advancements have focused on accommodating smaller screens and this trend has no signs of slowing down. With that being said, the future of responsive design will continue to find what is best for devices of all sizes.

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Have a question about responsive design? Ask us and we’ll answer your question in our next Webcast Wednesday!