Why Local Small Businesses Need a Mobile Site
There are 3 critical reasons why a small business MUST have a mobile ready website.
- People are searching everyday for local businesses on their smart phones
- These same people leave if the site is not optimized for their mobile phone
- The people that do stay on the site – because it’s mobile ready – either call or visit the local business over 75% of the time.
A research study released on the Google Mobile Ads Blog on April 26, 2011 stated that:
- 95% of smartphone users have searched for local information
- And of that 95% – 88% of these users take action within a day
- Furthermore, 77% have contacted the business, with 61% calling and 59% visiting the local business
As you can see, it’s critical for local businesses to have a mobile ready site.
But not all mobile sites and solutions are created equal.
Getting Clear on Mobile Marketing
For some reason people everywhere are making Mobile Marketing something complicated. Whether they’re advising us to use a confusing script or plugin to create mobile sites or if they’re saying, “Hey, don’t create mobile sites at all. Just create an app.”
All their ramblings do nothing more than cause confusion and paralysis-by-analysis. We get so much misinformation that we don’t know which way is up. Much less who to trust when it comes to getting the right info.
Unfortunately there is not one right solution that will solve ALL of our mobile marketing problems. Sometimes a mobile site is the right gig. Other times it might make sense to create an app. Every situation is different.
This is very evident when it comes to local offline businesses.
There are so many people telling us what we should be doing and nearly ALL of it is wrong!!
We constantly hear, “You need a responsive theme.” “You need an app.” “You need to make your entire site mobile friendly.” bla, bla, bla.
Let’s get clear and bust through a few of the most common myths.
Common Myths Busted!
Myth: Local businesses need a Responsive Web Design (or theme)
Truth: First off, let’s define what a Responsive Wed Design is:
According to Wikipedia: a Responsive web design (often abbreviated to RWD) is an approach to web design in which a site is crafted to provide an optimal viewing experience—easy reading and navigation with a minimum of resizing, panning, and scrolling—across a wide range of devices (from desktop computer monitors to mobile phones).
While this sounds great on paper – and in some situations it works great – most responsive sites and WordPress Themes do NOT look professional on a mobile device. Nor are they very user friendly. Most of the time the responsive theme forces itself to squeeze things together and this causes a user experience that is less than optimal.
With all that being said, the truth of the matter is that local businesses do NOT and should NOT use a Responsive Web Design.
Myth: Local businesses should only use a mobile app and not worry about a mobile site
Truth: Having a mobile app for your local business is a great thing! There are a lot of benefits to having one. However, since when does it have to be one or the other?
Forcing customers to download and use a mobile app instead of giving them immediate access to a user-friendly mobile site does not result in a quality user experience.
If you want to utilize a mobile app for your local business, then by all means do that. But do not waste the tremendous benefits of using a mobile site just because you want to create an app. A mobile site should be priority number one. Then you can move on to phase two – which can be your mobile app.
Myth: Local businesses need to make their entire site mobile friendly
Truth: This one is kind of silly. Based on what we’ve already learned why would a small business ever need to make their entire site mobile friendly?
IMPORTANT: The reality of the situation is that when a consumer lands on a local small business website from a mobile device they are usually – like 90%+ – looking for one-thing. Their contact information! Either a phone number to call or an address they can drive to.
Consumers are NOT looking for the company’s blog, 27 pages of information or a bunch of platitudes attempting to describe how much better they are then the rest.
Again, we are talking about a specific situation – a local consumer looking for a local business. Certainly what we’ve discussed so far would not be all encompassing to every possible scenario out there. However, when it comes to local businesses I challenge anyone to prove me wrong.
Imagine this scenario for a second…
A person searching for a local pizza shop, auto mechanic or even a dentist. What is it that they are searching for? Most likely, it’s the business’ phone number so they can call them. In other cases, they may be looking for the address because they can’t find their location. Consumers are NOT looking to read their blog. Nor are they looking to scroll through pages and pages of content that does not mean anything to them.
The bottom line: when consumers search a local business on their mobile device they want to call them or they want to visit them.
For a local business to take advantage of mobile marketing they do not need super sophisticated software, solutions or apps. They need simplicity.
Local Businesses Need Mobile Site Simplicity!
That’s right. When it comes to a mobile site for a local small business, service based business, independent professional and most entrepreneurs – less is more.
They don’t need over complicated solutions to provide what consumers need.
They need a simple solution, that works, that’s flexible and will give the consumer what they want and expect!
Let’s think about it for a second…
If something is over complicated or confusing the likelihood of us actually using the “solution” is very low.
And that’s only the first issue.
The second issue is that most of the complicated solutions are ones filled with a bunch of bells and whistles that do not add value to the customer experience. OR these bells and whistles simply won’t be used anyway. That means the small business is paying extra or higher prices for features that they’ll never use. Doesn’t make much sense does it?
Can We Agree On One Thing?
I hope we can agree that when it comes to local small businesses their needs are unique and different then other businesses. At least when it comes to mobile marketing.
Businesses that are web based and generate all their revenue online can benefit greatly from using a Responsive Web Design. But when it comes to a small local business it just doesn’t make sense.
We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again,
Local small businesses need a mobile marketing solution that is easy to use and offers the consumer what they need when they need it – the business’ phone number and address.
And now you can provide that to them…
A Quick Introduction to the
Premium WordPress Plugin…
WP Local Mobile was created specifically for local small businesses. Especially service-based businesses, independent professionals and most entrepreneurs. I’m sure there are plenty more uses but this was the target market.
This plugin redirects users on any mobile device – Ex., smart phone, iPhone, Android, etc. – to a beautiful and professional mobile friendly site.
You can also control the devices that the mobile site appears. For example, for tablets, iPads and Kindles there is no reason to be redirected to the mobile site because the regular site looks great on those devices. However, if for some reason you or your client wants their site to be redirected to the mobile version you can make that happen!
This is a super easy plugin to use and covers all the essentials that a small business needs for an effective mobile friendly site.
Drew,
Thanks for clearing out so much nonsense perpetuated about what small businesses should have for an effective mobile website!
As a small business owner myself, I want to point out that I am deluged with offers for this service. Most of them are overpriced and overdone. For example, you discuss the drawbacks of apps for a small business. I agree, a limited mobile website is superior.
You bet! It drives me crazy how people try to overcomplicate things to make their “solution” appear to be a better fit.
“Less is more” baby!!