Over the past few months I have been doing a lot of reading up
and watching of responsive web design tutorials. As I wanted
to implement the technique into a few of the sites I have developed
recently.
But as I trawled the net for 'How to' guides and started to test
sites I found (Including industry advocates) it got me
thinking, and I started to think it could actually have a negative
impact on your business.
I am now a 100% believer that mobile and tablet browsing (And
online ordering) is HUGE now, and growing year on year - And if you
haven't seen it, here is a great infograph from Kissmetrics about
this subject called 'Mobile Mania'.
http://blog.kissmetrics.com/mobile-mania/?wide=1
But as I started to look at these sites that had implemented
RWD, I couldn't help but start to disagree with the notion that
using these techniques is the right way to go.
My thinking goes like this…
Design
You design a nice site , say based on the 960 grid - It looks
good, reads and lays out nicely. Then you have to start
chopping bits out and change spacing, squeezing columns headings
start to go on multiple lines etc.
It sort of destroys your design (and if you work with
designers, you'll know how much they will appreciate that!),
and takes away everything you have worked to create in the first
place. I realise the 'Mobile First' design gang will probably
jump in at this point, but unless your mobile traffic and
conversions seriously out weigh your 'desktop' users - Then in my
opinion its not the right way to go, you should be designing for
your main audience and giving them a display that's optimised for
them first.
I just think you end up with a site which doesn't really make
you stand out from the crowd, doesn't really resemble what the site
should look like and actually makes you look a little less
professional than your competition?
Trust / Calls To Action
Another thing which popped into my head is conversions and calls
to action. For sites that sell products and let people buy
through the site - Usually quite a lot of time is put into trying
to portray trust to the user, such things as secure shopping logos,
payment gateway logos, Seals (Not the ones that swim in the Sea
), Awards etc.
In theory all these will either be lost, or manoeuvred further
down the page (I'll get onto this more below) so the users
are less likely to see them (If at all). This also goes for
your calls to action, if you have buttons or mini banners
positioned to try and entice the user to do what you want or get in
contact.
These are also very likely to get moved or replaced with actual
content, leaving me thinking that in theory you are less likely to
convert the user?
Usability
This is actually my biggest gripe with this new technique, and
maybe it is just me. But I like seeing a full site on my mobile, I
like being able to swipe my finger and navigate to specific
portions of the site. I like pinching and zooming in and
out and focusing where I want to.
I don't like having to scroll down and down and down, just to
read the first bit of content and then scroll all the way back up
to find the navigation. Again this is probably just my
preference, but I'm sure I can't be alone in thinking this can
I?
Definitely Optimise For Mobile
What I do believe in though is testing your site and optimising
it to work correctly on Mobiles (Something I haven't done on
this one yet!!) - As there are some easy CSS tweaks and
changes that will make your site look a lot better in most mobile
browsers.
As long as you take the time to do this testing, and it
functions correctly within a mobile browser (Purchases works,
content forms work etc.) then I'm not convinced that using
responsive web design is better, or will it help convert more
people into potential business.
Anyway, that's just my two pence worth… Love to hear your
thoughts about it below.