There are three delivery methods that allow you to present your content and services on mobile devices to customers.
- Native apps - an app that customers can download from an apps store or your website.
- Mobile style sheets - a mobile version of your PC website displayed with mobile styling/sizing.
- Mobile sub-sites - an alternative version of your website with styling and content you specify. Sub-sites are a section of your website. They can have its own navigation, design, content and styling, with content items shared with your main website.
There are pros and cons of each alternative, but mobile sub-sites are the best choice to get the optimum balance between:
- Ease of content management
- Value for money
- Ability to engage customers
1. Full native mobile application (app)
The app - a custom built full native mobile application for your content and services that will work on specific mobile operating systems such as Google's Android or Apple's iOS. These are downloaded by the customer from the relevant app store and contain all the content and functions you wish to supply to your end users.
Pros
- This can provide probably the best user experience as the application will be a native app and therefore very responsive and should follow all the phones User Interface (UI) guidelines, giving the end user a true app experience.
- The app can be found in the app store for easy convenience of downloading and updating.
- Apps often work offline as well as in a connected state (depending on the service the app is performing).
- The app can use some of a phone's feature like geo positioning.
- You can easily charge for the app/content if required, at the point of download/upgrade.
Cons
- You will probably need to build 3 or 4 apps if you want to support most mobile platforms, although you can try to port one app via a generic application framework to other platforms, which may spoil the native feel.
- The price of a custom app is not cheap and once you factor in all the different platforms, this will quickly become a very expensive option.
- Maintaining the content of a bespoke app and its variants will prove costly and time consuming. Content may also need to be managed differently for a custom app, especially if you want to retain a full offline experience.
- Content will probably need to be augmented from information from the web anyway, resulting in a disconnected customer experience.
- Integration into other systems will prove challenging and require bespoke development.
- Tracking will need to be custom implementation into your app and data will not be easy to compare to you website. Google Analytics will not work in the same way on apps as it does on a mobile website.
Mobile style sheets
Mobile devices can automatically display mobile versions of your website. Browser, platform and screen size detection is used to determine if a mobile device is browsing your site. The device can then be supplied a different style sheet to change the display of your content so the layout is better on a reduced screen size.
Pros
- This approach can be very simple/cheap to implement and maintain.
- The fact that you only have one site means there is little management overhead.
- Integration of services is easier as the delivery is just a web app.
- Fewer skills are needed, as this is a web application and not a custom phone app.
- A mobile style sheet should be much cheaper than a native app, as one version should cater for all devices.
- Integration should be cheaper as other web systems may still be able to just work, though there may be issues with this approach.
- Tracking will be integrated into you webstats by default.
Cons
- Customers will not get that native app experience. User experience cannot be controlled very well as style sheets are just not up to the job yet.
- The website can still prove slow as the style sheet will download the whole standard site even if it is not displayed.
- Content and services are not tailored for mobile users and their use cases which are very different from the PC "browsing experience".
- You may not get the benefit of a phone's capabilities such as geo positioning.
- Integration may prove to be impossible for some web applications as they are not able to be scaled appropriately.
- The approach can lead to challenging design decisions due to limiting your html to being able to cope with normal and mobile rendering views.
- Mobile tracking may get buried by your web traffic so will need custom reports and expert analysis/insight.
Mobile sub-sites
Similar to the mobile style sheet approach above, a mobile sub-site can be displayed automatically by a mobile device. However a mobile sub-site can be specially prepared with content and layout for a mobile device. Content is shared with your main website for ease of management and brand consistency.
Browser, platform and screen size detection are used to determine if a mobile device is browsing your site, and the device is redirected to the alternative sub-site. The full site can be accessed if the user requires it.
Pros
- Good user experience just falling short of native app although this can be mimicked pretty well.
- Content and services can be focused to the mobile users use cases.
- Phone capabilities can be used such as geo and dialling ability.
- Much cheaper than a native app, one version should cater for all devices.
- Much easier to maintain content and service integration.
- Less technical skills are needed as this is a web application and not a custom phone app.
- Easier integration as the delivery is just a web app.
- Accessibility can kept consistent with the PC website by the content management system.
- Tracking will be integrated into your webstats by default.
Cons
- There will be some additional overhead due to the management of an additional site, although this can be easily minimised by GOSS iCM.
- The user needs to be connected to the web, though most services require connectivity anyway as does the latest content.
- The user experience is not quite as good as a native app, though the url can be bundled into app so it can appear in an app store.
- Some integrations issues exists as the mobile site may not be able to integrate smoothly with all 3rd party web applications.
- Mobile tracking will be reported separately which may need custom reports to get a global view.
The way forward
Each business needs to consider their strategic objectives and weigh up the pros and cons when selecting their delivery method. Considering all factor, most businesses pick mobile sub-sites as the best choice to get the optimum balance between:
- Ease of content management
- Value for money
- Ability to engage customers
Mobile website strategy whitepaper
As more users adopt mobile devices it is important for businesses to understand mobile website usage and customer requirements, which may be similar to your PC website. But there are differences, particularly in experience, and web managers should aim to embrace the differences and exceed customer expectations.
Deciding to deliver your mobile website as a sub-site is just one aspect of developing a mobile website strategy. This whitepaper examines user trends and what businesses can do to capitalise on the opportunities that mobile websites offer and includes:
- Macro trends
- Defining a mobile strategy
- Mobile website delivery options
- Defining and refining user journeys
- Mobile landing page best practice
Download your copy here
Mobile Website Strategy
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