Common Mistakes In Web Design For Mobile Devices (Part 2)

In part one of this article, we looked at how failing to take into account the device width, form difficulty, content and finger limitations can have a detrimental affect on the user experience for mobile devices. These four mistakes, however, are not the only ones you will have to prevent making when it comes to web design for mobile devices – there are plenty more that are still commonly made.

• Page Loading
  Unfortunately, page load time for mobile devices tend to be much slower than those for laptop and desktop computers. There are many things that can contribute to slow page loading, including: heavy image files, an excess of images, a large number of imports, and a failure to tell the user that the site is actually still loading. It is the job of web designers to cut this wait time down as much as possible.
• CSS3 and HTML5
  The use of CSS3 and HTML5 in web design for a mobile device has many advantages (such as avoiding many kinds of image), but they are very much neglected in this respect. You must keep in mind that mobile devices actually do support CSS3 and HTML5, so why not utilize them to make the user experience better?
• Home Screen Icon
  By making your home screen icon attractive during the web design process, you are making it much more likely to get clicked on. Internet users tend to refrain from reading too much if they can help it, so having a home screen that is full of shortcuts is really not going to do much for your click rates. The great thing about iPhones and Android devices? They add in the gloss and rounded corners for you!
• Unresponsive
  Many in the industry believe that responsive web design is the answer to many of the issues outlined in these articles. Whilst it can be a little tricky to implement, it is highly effective when done well. So, what is responsive web design? Ultimately, it is the creation of a website that adjusts itself to suit the device it is being viewed on – for example, it might be 4 columns on a laptop, 3 on an iPad, 2 on a tablet and 1 on a smart phone.

As mobile devices are so ingrained in our current society, effective and functional web design for these devices becomes of paramount importance for anyone hoping to get ahead in the industry. By avoiding the common mistakes outlined above and in the previous article, you can help to ensure that your mobile website is highly user-friendly.