Responsive websites - Buzzword or time to take action?

Over the last few months the buzzword around the digital marketing industry has been "responsive website design" but what does it all mean and how does it affect you?

Companies like Google, have been striving to improve the user experience for people on the web. So as of April 2015, they implemented a major change to their algorithm. This major change will effectively penalise websites that are not optimised for mobile devices such as smart phones, tablet devices, laptops and desktops.

So is it a good thing? Personally I think so, and all the latest figures show that mobile devices are on the verge of taking over (if not already) as the primary medium for viewing online content. First we had the carrot – “your customers are going mobile” – but now here comes the stick - “Google’s algorithm change”. The carrot you can ignore for a period of time until one day you figure out all your online business has gone away – “death by 1,000 cuts” – but the stick is more dramatic: all of a sudden your website is not ranking in Google and getting back to that number one position might not be as simple as you think. So how do you know if your website is responsive or not, and how do you fix it if it is not?

Google provides a number of web development tools to check the quality of your website; just go to the link above and submit your website address, and keep your fingers crossed. For the unfortunate websites that fail this test, it’s time to act! But do not worry, help is at hand, contact BigNet Design who specialise in responsive web design or contact us by phone in our Dublin office on (01) 662 9398. Our web development experts will guide you through the process and advise you on the best action to take.