Want your website to be smart phone friendly? A separately designed and developed mobile website isn’t your only option for successfully reaching the mobile audience. As avid smart phone enthusiasts, we’ve always been sure to make our sites look great across all platforms. Here are some of our favorite tips:
 

Design for easy accessibility to main navigation items. Because of the obvious size difference in viewing a website on a monitor versus a mobile device, planning for an accessible and slightly larger navigation is key. For instance, on the Culinary Culture website, the navigation can be accessed without having to zoom or pan, making for a more intuitive smaller screen experience.
 

Create an environment for the logo that is clear and uncomplicated. The footprint for a company’s logo viewed on a mobile device is small. Create space in the site where the logo is showcased in a clear way – for example, our client Walbridge has their logo placed on a clean gradient at a size that is still recognizable at 10x20 pixels.
 

Keep contact information large and accessible. One of the most frequent reasons a visitor will look at a website through mobile devices is to quickly find contact information. Don’t lose a sale because a phone number looked better as image text; keep phone numbers in html text, like DRIFIRE has done, so the user is able to click and call, and have all contact info in plain site.
 

Remember, there are no hover states. On a mobile device you can’t hover, there is only click, pan, zoom, so don’t make a drop down menu, or button rollovers imperative to the website’s user experience.
 

Construct clear and easy to find actionable items. Driving traffic to specific areas of a site is more difficult because of size limitations on mobile devices. Buttons and links drawing the user further into the site need to be at a size and position obvious for someone using a mobile device. Taza Chocolate is a great example of how to guide the user into their ecommerce store when viewed on a small screen through large, boldly colored buttons. NOTCOT.org also uses large actionable areas to allow the user easy accessibility to their links on a mobile device.
 

Have questions? Give us a call at 617.338.8922 or contact us here.