The Explosion of the Mobile Web…..Is Your Website Ready?
Just a few short years ago, it was a good bet that you would read articles like this one on your PC or laptop. Today, it’s just as likely that you are reading this article on a smartphone or tablet computer. So what’s changed, what happened? The mobile web happened, that’s what – and the Internet will never be the same. So, what’s the mobile web?
Loosely defined, the mobile web is a way of accessing the Internet via a wireless network, using a handheld mobile device such as a smartphone or tablet computer.
The Explosion Of The Mobile Web
The mobile web is growing at a phenomenal pace, and is forecast to overtake the desktop web in 2014. In other words, more users will access the Internet using a mobile phone rather than a PC for the first time.
Approximately 900 million people currently access the web with mobile phones, compared to 1.4 billion desktop Internet users. In 2014, mobile web users will outpace desktop users (approximately 1.7 billion mobile users to approximately 1.65 billion desktop users). By 2015, the number of mobile web users is expected to increase to 2 billion.
Assuming an annual growth rate of about 2 percent annually between 2010 and 2015 in cell phone subscriptions (77 percent of the world’s population will have cell phone subscriptions in 2010 and 87 percent will have subscriptions in 2015), about 6.35 billion people worldwide will have a mobile phone subscription and approximately 1 out of 3 subscribers (or 2 billion out of 6.35 billion) will be accessing the Internet on mobile phones. (Source: Wikimedia)
And according to the August, 2011 edition of eMarketer, 33 percent of mobile users are looking to access local content relevant to their GPS positioned location.
Is Your Website Ready?
So, what does all of this mean to you? It means more people than ever will be viewing your website through a mobile device such as a smartphone or tablet computer, via a wireless network. It also means that if you want to survive and thrive, you have to adjust and adapt, and make your website mobile web friendly. The good news is, it’s easier than you think.
“Within the Alexa top 1,000 sites, 40.1 percent of all sites are mobile-friendly. These sites represent the world’s most popular web properties, like Google, Facebook and Yahoo!
Beyond the top 1,000, mobile friendliness still holds strong but is not yet as widespread. Of the top 10,000 Alexa sites, 29.7 percent perform well on mobiles. Once the input data is broadened to include the top 500,000 sites, the total number of mobile-friendly sites drops to 19.3 percent.” (Source: mobiThinking.com)
If you haven’t already done so, the very first thing you need to do is bring your website up to speed visually. In other words, you want to make sure that users of mobile devices can view your site optimally.
The quickest and easiest way to do this is to run your site through the MobiReady online testing site. This is a free service that evaluates mobile-readiness using industry best practices & standards.
The free report provides both a score (from 1 to 5) and in-depth analysis of pages to determine how well your site performs on a mobile device. There are also other tools that will allow you to test your site for mobile readiness. In fact, here are 10 Excellent Tools for Testing Your Site on Mobile Devices.
Personally, I have serious doubts about the accuracy of these types of testing tools. For example, I ran my site through MobiReady, and it gave my site a 2 out of 5 score which, according to their analysis is bad. I got the exact same score before and after I mobil-optimized my site.
Here’s the problem: I’ve had many friends and colleagues of mine, all with different makes and models of smartphones, on a variety of platforms, tell me that my site looks just fine on their phones. So while testing tools may be a useful resource, the true litmus test is what users of mobile devices are seeing – so be sure to ask them.
That being said, there ARE things you can do to mobile-optimize your website.
How To Make Your Website Mobile Compatible 1. Have a fast-loading site. Chances are, most mobile-web users who are using their phones to access the Internet are using a slower 3G connection. You can help these users out by making sure your website code is clean, which will not only make for a faster-loading site, but faster downloads as well.
2. Don’t use flash. Not all mobile devices can see flash? Personally, I’m not a huge fan of flash sites anyway. But if you absolutely, positively have to have a flash site, be both smart and considerate. Make sure you have an alternate HTML version of your site as well.
3. Have a clean, easy to navigate website. Remember, mobile users are viewing your site on a tiny little screen. In addition, there is no mouse and not all mobile devices are equipped with a touch screen. So don’t make it harder for mobile users to view or utilize your site than it needs to be. Clean up the clutter and streamline your content. Simplify, simplify, simplify. If you keep it simple, your site will be user-friendly for everyone.
4. Use HTML phone numbers. Don’t make mobile users have to type in your phone number. Use HTML so that they can simply click to dial the number.
5. Avoid horizontal scrolling. Mobile users prefer to scroll vertically as opposed to horizontally. It’s easier and less of a hassle for them. Always create your content as a single column of text that wraps for mobile users.
6. Use images sparingly. As I mentioned earlier, most mobile users are using a slower 3G connection. As a result, heavier images can take forever to load. To avoid this problem, you should use images sparingly on your website. But if you do choose to use images, they should be lighter-weight jpeg, gif or png format. Also, make sure to compress your images to avoid zooming.
7. Voice Search. Google’s Voice Search on smartphones, has increased voice search usage by approximately 600% in the past year. Since mobile devices don’t have a traditional keyboard like a PC or laptop, voice search makes searching quicker and easier for smartphone users. So you should definitely keep an eye on this trend for SEO purposes. Bear in mind, people tend to search differently when speaking as opposed to typing. For example, while you might type-search “best virtual assistants,” you might voice-search “what are the best virtual assistant services?” Again, it’s a trend you should keep an eye on.
Indexing Of A Mobile Site
Google mainly recommends the following for better indexing of a mobile site.
• Google has a separate mobile bot for indexing mobile friendly pages. So, always redirect this bot (check for user agent ‘Googlebot-Mobile’) to the mobile version of your site. This bot should not see the normal site.
•Use the XHTML Mobile doctype so that search engine bots can clearly identify the page as mobile friendly.
•For each page, there should be a link for the standard view of that page. It will help Google to categorize mobile pages and its corresponding standard pages. (Source: The Right Way to Build a Mobile Site)
By David Jackson
How a Blog Could Revitalize Your Website
O.K. so you think you have an idea or even a product to sell through your brand new internet business.
Internet marketing is a brilliant business to be in. There are boundless opportunities to run online businesses which can make incredible amounts of money, if you have established that there is a market for your chosen niche or product, and have done the necessary research.
All set, ready to go?
Er, not quite.
You should establish a presence in your market before you unleash your product to the world.
If you are about to start an internet business, then you should be wondering about attracting traffic to your site. There are many advertising options available, but if money is tight, some of these options may not seem practical.
Advertising can be expensive especially if you are not too sure what you are doing. Money can be swallowed up very quickly if you do not study advertising techniques.
Promotion can take many weeks or even months to show results, and then may not be effective.
Many courses and books sold by some of the gurus are sometimes out of date. Outdated material and tactics which you pay for then find they just do not work.
You may have an excellent website, but bear in mind blogging is now probably more effective than a static site.
Of course, the most traditional way of running an online business over the last few years has been websites, and is still a very successful method.
However, blogging has moved to the fore because search engines seem to favor blogs over the standard static website.
For those who can constantly add to or update their blog, visits by search engines will become a more regular practice, which will give you more chance of a high ranking in the search engines.
The reason is that search engines seem to prefer blogs over traditional static sites and it is possible to see a page on your blog ranked on the first page in Google within 24 hours.
With a blog, you are updating on a regular basis, sometimes daily, and search engines love sites which are constantly updated, giving you a better chance of getting ranked more highly.
Therefore, blogging is probably the best way to build traffic to your site at the same time enabling you to become an expert in your field in a very short time.
A blog is very easy to use and so adding content to a blog is easy to do. A blog is similar to a diary or journal with which you can keep up-to-date with your thoughts and ideas.
It is easy to keep your customers updated with information or products.
You can build a relationship with your readers, thereby building confidence and respect as you are projecting yourself as an expert.
A blog also allows your visitors to post comments, so you are also creating an interactive environment which of course further develops your relationship with your visitors.
If your subject is one you are passionate about, then writing 300 words each day should not be very difficult. It should be simple to find endless ideas to write about. Adding to a blog on a daily basis will not take very long. You need only write about 300 words every day, and it gets easier the more you write.
Always make your content informative and good quality. Don’t ever give rubbish to your readers. Your readers should always be treated with the greatest of respect. After all, once you build up a large líst of members, who hopefully trust you because you have always given them quality, they will then trust you enough to purchase the products you have recommended to them.
The easiest way to set up a blog is to use a Google service called Blogger or WordPress. You can simply go to the website, choose a user name and the rest is simple. You can be up and running in minutes.
A big disadvantage with Blogger of course is that your blog is owned by Blogger and may be shut down by them without notice. Many thousands have been shut down without notice.
By far the best option is to set up your blog with WordPress because you will have full control over your blogging activities. Set up your blog with WordPress and host it on your domain.
The only downside with WordPress is that you must set your blog up yourself.
The power in your blog comes from the quality information you put into it, attracting readers to your blog and therefore establishing you as an authority and giving you credibility in your market.
Once again, the more often you can update your blog, the more often the search engines will visit. The more you can write, the more exposure you will get.
Your blog post does not have to be a great literary work, it can just be a paragraph or two on your specialist subject, but always make your information quality content, between 350 and 700 words.
You should use your blog to help build a líst of members, because it is one of the best ways of building a relationship with people who are keen to receive information from you.
Building a relationship will also build trust and confidence. Your readers will look forward to receiving e-mails or blogs from you in which you can recommend products and services.
The keyword here is recommend, rather than sell or promote. If someone feels that you have recommended – not sold – to them, then that will go a long way to build loyalty and trust.
If you can build loyalty and trust with your subscribers through your blog which establishes you as a respected expert, then you are on your way to a successful internet business which can easily earn you a substantial income.
Author
Ray Carr
For more information on creating a Blog for your site, please contact us.
Basics of Video Marketing on the Internet
Marketing through audio-video is very cheap as compared to other form of advertisement. It can also be said that one video can be equal to many other forms of promoting. This marketing technique can also be very cost effective and useful in driving more and more customer. And with the way video promoting is exploding the day is not far when it will become the most powerful way of online marketing. You may not believe it but majority of the clients prefer to watch a video about the company rather than reading about the same company.
Video marketing is becoming a large online marketing system. Several businesses nowadays are using video to reach out to their customers or clients. It is the most sorts after thing in internet marketing today and websites like YouTube and Google videos are providing the options for uploading your video so that it can be viewed by a large number of people over the internet.
But creating a video only will not make sure that your job is done as videos will not help you increase your page rank on Google as it’s a viral and relies majorly on community submission and social tags. Only a video commercial will not help in increasing your search rank. But it can surely increase your clientele as many people prefer watching then reading. In a recent survey it was found out that people prefer entertainment while learning and that is what video do it entertains people while they get to know about your business. Sites like YouTube can provide a great marketing campaign for your online business or website and at present you can gain effectively from these marketing campaigns online.
Checkout my online video marketing campaign for Satellite Imaging Corporation on YouTube. A remote sensing and GIS company that provides high resolution satellite image data for mapping purposes.
Majority of the people are still not using video marketing and are not comfortable with this marketing technique. It’s a widely open area to be taken to boost your business through video marketing. In future it certainly will be the mostly used marketing tool, so why not get you ahead of time and get maximum benefits from video marketing technique today. Companies that feel to reach masses would prefer this technique sooner or later as video marketing is effective and efficient.
Mirror of Self Reflection
Age creeps up on us all slowly stripping away our youth then one day we look into the mirror and the body does not seem to match the sparkle in the eyes anymore. Then we begin to look over our shoulder at our past and think I wonder what would have happened or what if I had taken this path?
The concept of there only being one life and a limited amount of time to live it is to most people like someone saying there is no Santa Claus. We simply want to believe in forever just like we wanted to believe in happily ever after as children.
You may think I am advocating quitting your job and going trekking in Africa but no that is not where this is going. Living is an art in itself it is not about time management or fit as much in as I can. It is about passion, depth, vision, love and much more.
I wish I could remember the taste of a meal long after I have eaten it, I wish I could see my partners face long after they have left, I wish I could feel my friends hug as she embraced me long after she had let go, I wish I could picture the one time my Mother said I love you long after she is gone, I wish I was so in tune with life, so aware, so enlightened that every moment was my greatest and I could feel it, taste it, and truly live it.
I do not want to wait until someone tells me there are no more moments left I do not want to feel cheated because a Higher Power took my moments away. I want to be grateful a Higher Power gave me the moment to begin with.
As youth slips away and it will slowly I want to be able to look in the mirror and see the happiness of a life lived with depth and passion etched in my face. I want to be able to feel the touch of my lovers hand as it brushed away my tears not just remember it. But unless I am truly aware truly in the moment at the time allowing myself to feel, letting go of expectations, letting go of the need to hold something back, unless that happens all I will have is a vague memory. I want more I want an imprint so strong I can carry it with me and feel it when the moments are at an end.
My wish for you is that you may look in the mirror of self reflection long before youth has disappeared. I hope you will realize life doesn’t need to be filled up with things rather it needs to be soaked up for all it has to offer right now at this very moment. My wish for you is that you may experienced even for a second a state of total being when everything falls away and time stands still and you can taste the air you breath, feel the earth pulsate beneath your feet and hear the whisper of the Angels.
Monique’s Mantra:
“Yesterday is the past, tomorrow is the future and today is a gift, that is why they call it the present”.
