Responsive Web Design: A Challenge Every Company Encountered
Background
In an effort to improve mobile user experience, Google introduced an algorithm update in April 2015, which negatively impacted non-responsive websites. While Google does not inflict a penalty for a non-responsive website, they do award preferential listings in the Mobile Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs) for sites that do offer a better UX across all devices. As a result, sites that were non-responsive saw less overall traffic, ultimately leading to a decline in revenue for ecommerce sites.
The Challenge
While many of our clients had modern, visually appealing and responsive websites, some had yet to implement responsiveness into their design. We made it our mission to make sure our clients were ready for the algorithm update and in turn, not see any decreases in their well-established SEO rankings.
The Details
18 months prior to the announcement, we started working with our clients to incorporate RWD into their website, this way they could be ahead of the trend when the inevitable update occurred. We also highlight for our clients the benefits of Responsive Web Design (RWD) and how it offers an improved User Experience (UX), allowing visitors to access a website from a range of devices in addition to desktops, such as tablets and smartphones.
Benefits of Responsive Website Design:
- Site visitors will receive the same improved UX across all devices
- RWD helps improve SEO rankings with search engines
- Clients see an increase in overall traffic to site when RWD is developed
In addition to the number of visitors a website receives overall, information gathering software such as Google Analytics can provide us with the percentage of users who have leveraged a mobile device to access the site. Furthermore, GA will drill even deeper to advise which device was used.
In order to avoid or improve a negative impact by Google’s Mobile Algorithm update and to simply offer website visitors the best UX possible, choose to convert to a Responsive Website Design.
The Results
By the time the algorithm update was released, the majority of our clients had responsive designs in place, while our remaining clients were working with us to get their sites responsive within the following weeks. Ultimately, our clients were able to provide their users with a better site experience, and not lose any valuable SEO rankings in the process.
Alternative business loan firm:
- 375% increase in mobile & tablet traffic
- 416% increase in new users
- Bounce rate decreased by 8%
- 538% increase in Goal Completions
Talon Air Jets:
- 36% increase in mobile & tablet traffic
- 38% increase in new users
- 27% increase in average session duration
- 59% increase in goal completions
Active Web Group:
- 171% increase in mobile & tablet traffic
- 185% increase in new users
