Optimizing Mobile Pages

Using best practice is almost like using a short cut. Someone else tried things, figured out what works and what doesn’t, and now you can use it. Thank them, and feel free to try other things; you may be the newest creator of a best practice. If you are using the best practices then you are showing that you have truly gained the knowledge and are putting it into action. One of these best practices is having a mobile friendly website.

One best practice that is a key to optimization is make sure your website is mobile friendly. As the number of searches that happen on mobile devices increase, the importance of having a mobile accessible website also becomes more important. I want to pause for a second and think about mobile browsing, I do it and I’m sure you have too. I think there is an important difference between a mobile accessible website and mobile-friendly website. When I say, mobile accessible, I mean they have a mobile version, and when I say, mobile friendly, I am saying that the website is usable from a mobile device.

Here are some images to help illustrate the point I am trying to make. The website that most of my University classes use for discussion boards and turning in papers claims it can be utilized on a mobile device, but take a look at the mobile version

This does not show my classes, or the option to create a discussion board, two of the main reasons my school uses this website. 

At the bottom of that image it says, "Desktop Version" the only way for me to see the classes I am in and the option to start a discussion board post. Which is fine with me, but it takes away the joy of having a website that is usable on mobile devices. Some websites do not offer a different version of their content at all for the mobile browser at all. Let's see if the website's desktop version can still be useful on a mobile device. 

One of the main purposes of this website is discussion boards, as mentioned before so I'm going to go ahead and start a new thread on my phone. Clicking the blue new thread button opens up an HTML box to type your post. On my phone it looks like this:

So it automatically makes the box fit on the screen, and there was a description of the assignment above, and the posts of those who have already posted theres were below, and it all adjusted to fit on the screen. I do not consider that the most mobile-friendly because it would require zooming and a lot of scrolling to make the text readable. 

Now when it actually comes to posting on the discussion board, here is what you see:

The HTML box does not fit as well, and you cannot read the text at all without moving back and forth, as well as while you type the page moves a little but does not keep up. 

This is an example of a mobile accessible website but not the friendliest. Providing users with the option to fully access a website while on their phone is considered a best practice. There is no real reason that there needs to be mobile versions of everything, but it makes the consumers happy and that is a major part of Search Engine Optimization, making people happy with your brand and potentially your product.