The votes have been cast, the ballots have been counted and the results are in:
Responsive web design wins.
Both Google and Bing recommend responsive web design over dedicated mobile sites. Now mobile sites are not only a hassle to keep updated, but in the case of Bing, it’s going to cost you SEO.
Google Says …
Although Google has yet to make “official” guidelines, when you consider a mobile site will double your content for crawlers, is not ideal.
“In December 2012, Google did release an update to their mobile-bot that now crawls the web as a smartphone, but most blogs reported little change to results – Google still seemed to favour desktop sites over mobile sites.”
Google hasn’t completely kicked mobile only sites to the curb, yet, but it’s probably only a matter of time.
Bing Says …
Bing has been very upfront in it’s distain for dedicated mobile sites:
‘At Bing, we want to keep things simple by proposing the “one URL per content item” strategy.’
Bing goes on to say:
‘Redirection to alternative URLs for mobile content… is not the approach we recommend for best SEO results.’
Having a dedicated mobile site will actually have a negative SEO effect!
It Makes Sense
If you’re church, ministry or organization is using a dedicated mobile site, lose it. When you approach your next redesign, make sure it’s responsive! Besides, having one website that supports both desktop and mobile users, will only reduce the amount of work it takes to maintain your website. With a mobile site, you have to make changes, twice — once for the desktop and once for the mobile. Double the time, money and energy.
If your church, ministry or organization has a website in the works, make sure it’s responsive! You’re investing time and money in launching a new website, the last thing you want to do is have it be outdated before it’s even finished.
[via Speckyboy | Image via Pawel Kabanski]
Allan White says
I find it interesting that some of the “mobile-only” solution providers out there are still trying to spread FUD about responsive design. My guess is they see it as a threat to their business model.
It’s simple: design *one* site, with several viewport breakpoints, or just try to support the hundreds of user-agents and device models out there. It’s a losing game.
More work up front, less down in the long term.
Eric Dye says
Spot on.
Chris Ames says
We’ve been wrestling with this for Standard recently. I totally agree in one responsive site with multiple viewport breakpoints. The question is… how many?
Standard will have 3-4 (don’t recall the exact umber). But we’ve been discussing dropping it down to 2. Mobile (single column) and Desktop (traditional).
Thing about tablets… they do a great job already with handling desktop sites. Panning and zooming on a tablet is near effortless. Nothing like on a desktop, so it makes more sense.
Plus with display resolutions getting tighter on iPad… less reason the spend the extra time and money on a tablet sized viewport.
vietchristian says
Amen!
Eric Dye says
🙂