These days, the mobile optimization of most websites goes without question. Even for your franchise.
Mobile devices (excluding tablets) generated about 55 percent of website traffic, consistently hovering around the 50 percent mark since the beginning of 2017.
And mobile internet usage is only growing. Gone are the days when we can assume that most visitors are viewing your franchise website on a full browser.
Mobile optimization is about making sure that visitors who access your franchise website through mobile devices have an outstanding experience that’s customized to their device. The most successful mobile optimization should feel seamless for the mobile user.
There are a few ways to optimize your franchise website’s user experience:
- Responsive site: It follows the same HTML and CSS as your full franchise website but renders the same on all devices, adjusting to the screen size.
- Dynamic-serving site: Its server will respond with different HTML and CSS on the same URL, depending on what device is being used by the visitor.
- Separate HTML site: It is an entirely different HTML website that is a modified version of your site and is only served to mobile and tablet users.
Fun fact: You can actually check the mobile-friendliness of your franchise website with Google Webmaster Tools. Once you submit your site, you can navigate to Search Traffic and then Mobile Usability to see any errors that affect your mobile optimization (as well as suggested fixes).
Check out our 16 tips for a mobile-friendly website that you can’t ignore.
If your franchise website isn’t quite ready for mobile primetime, here are six reasons why you (or your franchisor) should consider an upgrade.
Better user experience
This shouldn’t require a ton of explanation. If you’ve ever opened a link on your mobile browser where the website wasn’t optimized for mobile, you’ve seen the teeny tiny rendering (or jumbled, hot-mess rendering) that can happen.
It simply leads to a difficult user experience. The determined visitor can make it work by zooming in or rotating the screen, but you risk losing most of your franchise website visitors with a bad experience.
About 60 percent of mobile users in the past 12 months have encountered problems when browsing websites that have led them to abandon the page.
You don’t want your franchise website to be part of that statistic.
More time spent on your franchise website
While many value pageviews, time is the true currency online. The longer a visitor stays on your franchise website, the more likely they are to convert to a customer.
When a user can easily navigate your mobile-optimized franchise website, the longer they’ll browse.
Faster load speed
When you haven’t optimized your franchise website for mobile, the amount of time it takes for your site to load on a mobile device can be significantly longer. And by significant, we really do mean mere seconds, but every second counts.
And, in fact, your non-optimized site might not render at all.
This is just another way to lose visitors (and potential customers for your franchise business).
Website visitors are impatient. They will abandon a page if they have to wait more than six to 10 seconds.
Boost your mobile SEO
Search engine optimization (SEO) involves an entire range of topics all on its own, but in this case, mobile optimization will boost your franchise website’s rankings in Google searches.
Specifically, Google recommends a responsive approach to mobile optimization. If that’s not possible, the second-best option for mobile SEO is to create a separate HTML website for your franchise to serve to mobile users.
Increased reach
With mobile usage only increasing, you really open your franchise up to a section of the market who do prefer to browse the internet on their mobile devices.
Better reach is simply better for your franchise business as you can engage these visitors and better convert them into paying customers.
Competitive edge (or being competitive at all)
We’ll be honest. It’s likely that your franchise competition is already using mobile optimization for its website(s). Of course, this can vary by industry and location (local or national brands).
But whether it’s about getting ahead of your competition or simply matching their sophistication level, either reason is equally valid in this economic climate.
Pull up your franchise competitors’ websites on your mobile device and see how they’re approaching mobile optimization. What are they prioritizing in their layouts? How clean is the design? How fast does it load? Are they even optimized at all?
This will give you a solid perspective of what you’re up against.
In conclusion
Keep in mind that when you are designing for franchise mobile optimization, you want to focus on:
- Larger buttons
- Autofill form fields
- Multiple screens (instead of scrolling)
- Smaller images
- Autodetected location settings
If you’re one of the three businesses right now that have not improved the mobile experience of your website, now is the time to upgrade and level up.
Plus, check out these 14 tips to improve your mobile marketing while you’re at it.
Need to level up your digital marketing process as a franchise? Consider DailyStory. Our application features automation, dynamic audience segmentation and more. We offer unique solutions tailored for the success of franchises specifically. Schedule your free demo with us today.
