What is responsive web design?

Getting to the bottom line, a responsive site is a website that adapts it's look correct on whatever mobile device on which it is being viewed.

Responsive WordPress design is a thing tons of designers talk about. And if you consider the level of importance of responsiveness and all the hullaballoo ) it's {impressive the number of websites that are still avoiding a responsive layout. By now, with the rapid increase in mobile usage, every WordPress website should get with the program and become responsive to give them the ability to have a website that looks great no matter what device they use

As iPhone, Android and tablet usage quickly expands, so does the need for mobile-friendly WordPress websites top wordpress themes like this one.

If SEO is a core component of your digital marketing strategy, having a responsive site is becoming a necessity.

Mobile sales have already overtaken sales of desktops, and use of mobile devices on the internet is predicted to outpace desktop internet use by 2014. It's becoming more evident that mobile search will overtake desktop search at some point in the near future too.

Since about 67 percent of users admit that they are more likely to buy from a mobile-friendly website, E-Commerce websites that rely on a strong SEO should start making the transition over to mobile-friendly WordPress sites, and in particular, to responsive web design.

The issue of whether to select a responsive WordPress website or maybe go with a separate site is a much talked about topic. To be fair, admittedly, both options have their plusses and minuses.

The choice that is best for your business depends on many factors, including the purpose of the site, the intended target audience, and whether or not SEO is a crucial factor.

If SEO is an important factor, here are some reasons why a responsive site is the best option for your mobile SEO strategy.

Google recommends responsive web design. search market share, when the biggest search platform Google gives advice, search marketers take note. Google advises us that responsive web design is its recommended mobile configuration, and they go even further and refer to responsive web design as the web design industry best practice.

Why? Well, it's because responsive design sites have just one URL and the same HTML, for any device, which makes it simpler and much more efficient for Google to find, crawl, index and organize. Contrast this with a completely separate mobile site which uses a different URL and different HTML than its desktop counterpart, which requires Google to index at least two versions of the same site.

Additionally, Google prefers responsive web design because content that stays on one site and just one URL is much easier for users to share, interact with, and link to than content that lives on more than just a single URL.

Take for example a Smartphone user who shares video from a mobile site with his friend on Facebook who then check out the content using a desktop, which means that that user viewing a bad looking mobile site on their desktop. This creates a bad user-experience, and because of the large emphasis Google is putting on user-experience as a SERP ranking factor, this is crucial to keep in mind with regards to SEO.

One web page, Many Screen Types

One of the key appealing aspects of a well crafted responsive design is that a well crafted responsive website can provide a better user-experience across all kinds of devices and screen sizes. This is an important characteristic, since it is probably impossible to predict all the devices and screen sizes searchers will utilize to access your site in even just a few years. A responsive site that operates well regardless of these unknowns will provide an enhanced and more steady user-experience than a distinct mobile site that is designed for a single device and screen size.

Let's take the following example. Someone searches for a product on their iPhone during a break at the office. They find a site that has the product they've been looking for, and decide to continue looking at this widget on the same site when they head home for the evening. But, when they arrive home, they will use their desktop computer rather than their Smartphone.

If the site in this example is a responsive website, our mystery shopper will have a good user-experience when going from mobile to desktop because they will get the same site on their desktop as they saw on their mobile device. On the flip side, if the website is a dedicated mobile site, the user will become angry with the fact that they have to locate the desktop version of the site, and locate the wonderful product that they had had trouble finding in the first place all over again.

More Simple to Maintain

Using a a unique desktop and mobile website requires having separate SEO campaigns. Managing one site and one SEO campaign is far easier than managing two sites and two SEO campaigns. This is a key advantage a responsive web page has over a separate mobile site.

That said, there some benefits to crafting a mobile-specific search optimization plan, like optimizing for terms that are much more likely to be searched when a user is on their Smartphone.

For example, a person looking for something on their mobile device for a pub may be likely to use "nearby" in their query. But, a separate mobile site is not a hard and fast requirement for a mobile SEO policy, and there's no reason why these types of mobile-specific key words can't be incorporated into a responsive design as well.

Finally

Responsive design is highly recommended by Google, it allows a single website to provide a great experience over many devices, like mobile phones and tablets, and it can also make managing your search engine optimization strategy simpler. For these reasons, a well crafted responsive design is most likely the top choice for your mobile search engine optimization stratagem.

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