Mobile Friendly websites

A few weeks ago, I posted a graphic that represented email clients in order of popularity. I will re post a similar graphic again from a campaign we sent last week.

This chart evidences the point I would like to make regarding the importance of ensuring that a website is designed to be mobile friendly. So much direct marketing is carried out by email today and the evidence is that much of it is being accessed by mobile email clients.  For email marketing to be successful, it is important that there are clear and compelling calls to action present. But if fulfilment of these marketing campaigns is to take place on an iPhone or an Android device then it is just as important that the destination website be mobile compatible.

It is possible to have a mobile application creates, with an RSS feed that your mobile users may access your news etc. however it is unlikely that unless you are a very big consumer brand that you are going to get many subscribers who regularly check that application and even less likely to get them to download it in the first place.

One area that is seeing rapid growth is streaming video. There are many websites that supply streaming content that I can access with my HTC. Sadly, they do not offer 100% usability. The thing is I am most likely to access this type of content from my mobile when I have a few minutes to spare and I am not at my desk or in my house.
Most of these systems do use flash and the problems with accessing rich flash content from a mobile device are well documented. No doubt we will see more websites developed to offer a better streaming experience to mobile users but I cant help but feel that some big players in this market are missing a trick.

Once again I have to say that if you are running direct email marketing campaigns, ensure that the landing page does not have flash. This will ruin the impact of the campaign on pretty much any mobile device. Another thing to be wary of is screen width. Make sure that the different elements of your homepage are able to exist next to each other without blocking important text, links or functions.

Th important point to remember is that New Media is all about giving customers choice. If customers are choosing to use mobile devices as web browsers, it would be a fool who fails to react to that basic market force.

Email Client Popularity

RNM recently sent our a Xmas greetings and end of year shut-down notice to our clients and prospects. As ever we monitor the open rates, click-throughs and other recipient behaviour on these emails.
One interesting statistic is which email clients recipients prefer to use.

The example illustrates clearly the hegemony of Outlook in all it's versions however interestingly the iPhone is the second most popular email client. Surprised?

Micro Business and Web Cowboys

Yesterday I had an interesting experience, a distraught woman called me up and begged me to look at her website. I was a little taken aback as, although it is a fairly reasonable request seeing as I work for a web agency, this person's emotional intensity made me feel uncomfortable.

When I typed in her URL Google Chrome sent me a warning message indicating that this website my be harmful to my computer. The lady on the telephone assured me that this was indeed a legitimate commercial website and I needed to have a look at it. With some degree of trepidation, I twice informed Chrome that I was indeed bonkers and I would like to proceed to view this website.

I was relieved at first to discover that rather than contraband naughty-stuff and black market pharmaceuticals, the website was simply for a horse trader. The poor thing! She has owned the URL for 5 years and recently paid very little for a new website that while not doing anything for her brand or offering any SEO compatible architecture had managed to upset Google terribly. When the world's most popular search engine rejects you, that's not good for business.

I told her how it was, she needed a new website on a new domain and quoted her on our bare bones CMS system. She gulped, my very reasonable £1500 for a basic but well built and user friendly website was way above her budget. I felt sorry for her, I didn't want her going back to one of the budget website companies, this was after all her livelihood.

The long and the short of it is I was able to cut out some functionality and use an off the shelf CMS system to get the price down to £1000 and she was able to stretch to that. I was happy that I was going to get another small business a quality web presence that helps them to promote their brand and grow their business.

She came in with her partner this morning and we discussed some layout options and design concepts. Happily this job is moving forward and we should have another very satisfied customer in a few days.

This got me thinking, why are people happy to entrust a major business purchase to an amateur or alternatively why are owners of Micro business so unwilling to invest in a decent web presence? Many micro business spend massive percentages of turnover on print advertising but if there is any one thing that can uplift your brand and convince potential customers to choose you over the competition it is a good professional website.

Instead what I see is hundreds or even thousands of DIY websites or build by numbers template sites that do very little for the company or the brand.

The Company I work for, Reckless New Media is a full service web agency. We have helped dozens of companies most of the SMEs to make the most of their presence on the web. One of the most powerful things the internet can do for you is capture data of people and business that are interested in your products or services. We always encourage our clients to include some form of data capture on their websites, used with an email marketing program, this can be the basis of a very effective, very economical digital marketing campaign.

If you are interested in any assistance or guidance in getting your brand on-line why not have a look at our Wild Wild Web campaign, aimed at getting micro business on line.