Mobile Website

A mobile website is your ordinary website, built so that it works properly on a phone. It keeps the same address and the same pages, so there is nothing to download. Because the screen is small, the text must stay readable and the buttons big enough for a thumb. That is also why the menu folds into a single button you can tap. Most people now meet a business this way, standing in a queue or sitting in a car.

The question owners really ask is different: do I need an app, or is a good mobile website enough? There is an honest test with four parts, and the first is whether people will open it most days rather than twice a year. Then ask whether you need a message that lands on their lock screen, or the camera, the map and their location. The last part is whether it must keep working with no signal. Two clear yes answers point to an app, while fewer than that means a site is enough.

Here is the part that surprises people, because an app has to be found, downloaded, and then kept on the phone. Many owners pay for one and watch it sit unopened on the few phones that took it. A website asks for none of that, since someone taps a link in a message and is already reading. Apps also pass a review at Apple and Google before each update, and that can take days. A mobile website goes live the same hour you change it.

So make the site good first, and remember that speed matters more than looks on a phone. Test it on a cheap handset over a weak connection, not on the newest model in the office. Then check that a person can finish the main task with one thumb, whether that is booking, ordering or finding your number. That is why, when Linkysoft takes on a website design and build, the phone layout is drawn before the desktop one.

A middle road is worth knowing about, because a progressive web app is a website you can save to the home screen and that sends notifications, without a store. It covers many cases at a fraction of the price, so ask about it before anyone budgets for an app. When the four tests do point to one, Linkysoft builds it as a mobile app on the same system that runs the site. Nobody then has to type the same order twice.