Thinking small and mobile...
It's no secret that the popularity and proliferation of mobile devices has meant many businesses need to rethink their digital and online strategies.
So what are the main options? Does everyone really need an app in the iTunes store? Is it a good idea to create a different version of your website for mobile? Does responsive design solve all these problems?
1. Responsive web design
The terms 'Responsive web design' refers to a technique that enables websites to adapt and rearrange themselves on different screens to provide optimal viewing and user experience across a range of different devices. This means the same content presents itself differently when viewed on a desktop, iPad or phone. For example, our site will attempt to rearrange itself in a sensible way when being view with iPhones and iPads and other small screen devices.
2. Mobile sites
Mobile sites are essentially websites built specifically for mobile devices. Thus the layout is optimised for small screens, and the images and multimedia kept to a minimum to reduce bandwidth demands. The UI is design specifically for fat fingers and - when done well - for gestures (slide and swipe).
3. Mobile Apps
Mobile apps are applications designed for mobile devices. They need to be downloaded and installed on user's devices before they can deliver content, but once installed, offer potentially a far more richer interaction with users.
If we take responsive web design as the baseline for cost, then (generally speaking) creating a second mobile site will be more expensive and a mobile app the most expensive. The following table attempts to summarise the relative benefits and promise of the three approaches:
Costs
- Responsive Site
- Cheapest
- Mobile Site
- Expensive
- Mobile App
- Most Expensive
Getting Published
- Responsive Site
- Easy
- Mobile Site
- Easy
- Mobile App
- May require approval process
Functionality
- Responsive Site
- Generally comparable to 'destktop website'
- Mobile Site
- Potentially some limitations compared to 'destktop website' (especially if plugins such as Flash are used)
- Mobile App
- Some functionality may be omitted, either for technical reasons or user-case reasons
Featureset
- Responsive Site
- Generally comparable to 'destktop website'
- Mobile Site
- Generally comparable to 'destktop website' but may make better (more targetted) use of available features for mobile device
- Mobile App
- Location services, push notification, access to camera, and other phone features
Internet Connection
- Responsive Site
- Required
- Mobile Site
- Required
- Mobile App
- Content can be made available offline
User Interface
- Responsive Site
- Reasonable optimisation for mobile device, limited capacity for interaction
- Mobile Site
- Better optimisation for mobile device, limited capacity for interaction.
- Mobile App
- Highly interactive and optimised for mobile device
Monetization
- Responsive Site
- Difficult
- Mobile Site
- Difficult
- Mobile App
- Most Easy
Websites that are responsive provide a good starting point - the opporunity to get your back-office working smoothly, publishing content and engaging with people using mobile devices. If budget is not an issue, then by all means make your main site responsive, create a mobile site for phones and an app so you can target users by location and send push notifications. However, if budget is limited, attempting too much and doing it poorly can be a big step backwards: Apps that offer nothing more than a responsive or mobile site are rarely received well. Mobile sites that lack key features provided by the main site, or become out of date as they miss out on the updates on the main site, can frustrate users.
← Designing For Festivals Return to list Geolocation: Where's my head at? →