After reading the first part of this article, you already know the basic knowledge about mobile friendly website and its advantages. Now, let’s go deeper to what mobile app, mobile website and responsive website, and whether you will need them in your business.

Mobile Application

A mobile app or application is used by smartphones to play games, view web content, save information, communicate with friends and so much more. An application that has been used with a particular device in mind tends to provide a smoother experience for the user. As such, the mobile phone industry has grown exponentially in the last five years fueled by the ease created by apps.

What does it take to build a mobile application? Many successful apps took large investments, multiple technical resources and a lot of planning to get them to actually start producing revenue. There are far more stories of apps that have failed miserably and cost tons of time and money for those involved. Building a successful mobile app to properly represent your business can take tens of thousands of dollars, many months of hard work and even more time to conceptualize and plan.

Do you need a mobile application? From what we have seen the answer to this question, for most businesses, is no. Unless you are looking, and willing, to go through a very involved, intricate mobile application build process, then your business does not necessarily need a mobile app. If your only objective is to make your website mobile-friendly, as is usually the case, the other available options may be a lot better instead.

Creating a Mobile Website

A website that has been built for mobile browsers specifically is what is known as a mobile website. They come with a simple design and the colors are very basic as are the links and the content provided. They tend to have a URL that is different not like that of main websites.

What does it take to build a mobile website? A few services available today make building a mobile website even easier than ever before. With costs being relatively low, building a mobile websitefor your business is not a bad option if you do not have the resources or know-how to go another route. That said, there are most definitely some SEO implications of using a mobile website so if you’re planning on going this route, then it is highly advised that you consult a SEO professional.

Do you need a website that is mobile-friendly? Absolutely. Do you need a mobile website, separate of your current website? It depends. If your current website provides such a bad experience to your mobile users that it is virtually unusable then you most definitely should consider building a mobile website. Or, if rebuilding your current website to be mobile friendly is not an option, then building a mobile website is probably the best way to go.

We are going to talk about responsive website on our next blog post: How to Make a Mobile Friendly Website – Part 2.