10 mobile-first practices for better conversions

According to Google, 58% of all searches done in the United States come from a mobile device.

That means that if your website is not optimized for mobile, you are missing out on a lot of potential conversions.

In this article, I’m going to share some of the best mobile-first practices to help you improve your website and get more conversions.

1. Use a mobile-responsive design

If you want to make sure your website looks great on mobile devices, you need to use a mobile-responsive design.

A mobile-responsive design is a web design approach that allows your website to adapt to different screen sizes. This means that your website will look great on a desktop computer, a laptop, a tablet, and a smartphone.

If you’re using a mobile-responsive design, your website will automatically adjust to fit the screen size of the device your visitors are using. This will help you provide a better user experience and improve your mobile conversion rates. Working with a digital marketing agency can also help ensure your website design strategy fully supports mobile-first performance.

On the other hand, if you’re not using a mobile-responsive design, your website may not look great on mobile devices. This can lead to a poor user experience and lower conversion rates. You can always use a website audit tool to run a website-wide audit and know what you can improve in your website.

In fact, research shows that 57% of internet users say they won’t recommend a business with a poorly designed mobile website. And 40% of internet users say they’ll go to a competitor’s website after a bad mobile experience.

2. Keep your forms short and sweet

Forms are a great way to collect leads on your website, but it’s important to keep them short and sweet on mobile.

Mobile users are more likely to abandon a form if it’s too long or complicated, so make sure you only ask for the information you really need.

If you can, use pre-filled forms to make it even easier for mobile users to convert. This means that if a user has already entered their information on your website, they won’t have to do it again the next time they visit.

3. Use a sticky call-to-action button

Another mobile-first best practice is to use a sticky call-to-action (CTA) button. A sticky CTA button is a button that stays in one place as the user scrolls.

This is a great way to make sure that your CTA is always visible and easily accessible, no matter where the user is on the page. It can also help increase the chances of a conversion because the user doesn’t have to scroll back up to the top of the page to find your CTA.

For example, if you have a long-form landing page with a CTA button at the bottom, you could make that CTA button sticky so that it’s always visible as the user scrolls.

4. Use a hamburger menu

A hamburger menu is a small, three-line icon that expands into a full menu when clicked. It’s a great way to keep your mobile website uncluttered and easy to navigate.

Instead of listing out all of your menu items on your mobile website, you can use a hamburger menu to hide them and then reveal them when someone clicks on the icon.

This is a great way to keep your mobile website looking clean and organized, and it can help you reduce your bounce rate and improve your mobile conversion rate.

Just make sure that you don’t hide your most important calls to action in your hamburger menu. You want to make it as easy as possible for people to take the next step and convert on your mobile website, so be sure to keep those calls to action front and center.

5. Make your search bar easy to find

If a user can’t find what they want on your site, they’re likely to leave and go to a competitor’s site where they can.

That’s why it’s so important to make sure your search bar is easy to find. If someone wants to search for something on your site, they should be able to do so without having to hunt around for the search bar.

Make sure your search bar is prominently displayed at the top of your page, and make sure it’s easy to use on mobile. If someone can’t find what they’re looking for on your mobile site, they’re likely to leave and go to a competitor’s site where they can.

6. Prioritize your content

Content is king, and that’s true for your mobile website, too. Make sure your content is easy to read and navigate on mobile devices.

You should also prioritize your content based on what’s most important to your customers. For example, if you’re an e-commerce company, you might want to put your product categories front and center on your mobile website.

If you’re a service-based business, you might want to highlight your most popular services. Whatever your business, make sure your content is organized and easy to find on your mobile website.

7. Use large easy-to-read fonts

It’s not just important to use high-quality images. You also need to make sure that they’re large enough to look good on a mobile device.

If your visuals lose clarity, tools that help you unpixelate images can restore sharpness and make them look more professional on mobile screens. 

Make sure that all of the images on your mobile website are high-quality and large enough to look good on a mobile device.

If you’re not sure what size to make your images, you can use a tool like Google’s PageSpeed Insights to find out. This tool will tell you if your images are too small and give you recommendations on how to fix the problem.

Your website might look amazing with a cursive font. But if you’re trying to read it on a 5-inch screen, it’s going to be difficult to make out the words.

The same goes for any fancy font you choose. If users have to squint or zoom in to make out the words, they’re more likely to click away from your site.

Instead, choose an easy-to-read font that’s large enough to be seen on a mobile device. You can still use a fancy font for your headers and logos, but body copy should be easy to read.

8. Use high-quality compressed images

Finally, it’s important to use high-quality images and animated videos on your mobile website. Make sure the images and videos you use are clear, crisp, and professional.

Low-quality images and videos can make your website look unprofessional and can also make it difficult for users to see what you’re selling. On the other hand, high-quality images and videos can help you make a great first impression and can also help you showcase your products in the best possible light.

If you don’t have high-quality images and videos of your own, you can use stock photos and videos, use an AI image generator, or you can hire a professional photographer or videographer to create content for you.

Large image files are one of the main reasons why your website might load slowly on mobile. You can keep your website running quickly by compressing your images.

There are a few ways you can compress images. You can use an online tool, like TinyPNG, that compresses images in bulk. If you have a WordPress website, you can install a plugin, like Smush, that will compress images for you.

You should also avoid uploading images that are too large to begin with. For example, you don’t need to upload a 5,000-pixel-wide image to your website if the largest display size you use is 1,000 pixels wide.

9. Test

As with any aspect of your website, you should test your mobile site. This is the only way to know if your strategies are working and if they could be improved.

You can test your mobile site by using it yourself and asking other people to use it, too. You can also use tools like Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test and WebPageTest to get a more detailed look at how your site performs on mobile devices.

Testing is an essential part of any marketing strategy, but it’s especially important when you’re trying to improve your mobile experience. Always check your payment flow too — many businesses lose customers because of issues like Stripe and Apple Pay not working on mobile. There are so many factors that can impact how your mobile site performs, so it’s important to test different elements of your site to see what works best.

For example, you might want to test different calls to action to see which ones get the most clicks. Or, you might want to test different images to see which ones resonate best with your audience.

The key is to test one thing at a time so you can accurately measure the impact of your changes. If you try to test too many things at once, you won’t be able to tell which changes had the biggest impact on your conversions.

Finally, if you thought you could just set up your mobile website and never look at it again, think again. Trends shift quickly — for example, search interest in things to sell for Christmas spikes every year, so your mobile site must adapt constantly. Mobile-first design, like all good design, is iterative.

Even when you think you’ve found the perfect mobile design for your website, you should test it again and again. Not only will this help you find and fix any potential problems, but it will also help you ensure that your website is still relevant to your visitors.

10. Leverage referral marketing for mobile users

Mobile visitors are often your most engaged customers — they browse on the go, share content quickly, and make fast purchasing decisions. That makes mobile the perfect channel for referral marketing.

With tools like ReferralCandy, you can set up automated referral programs that work seamlessly on mobile. Customers can easily share referral links with friends via text, social media, or messaging apps, and receive rewards when their friends make a purchase. Because the entire experience is optimized for mobile, it feels natural and effortless for users — which helps you boost conversions and grow through word-of-mouth.

Conclusion

To ensure your mobile site is as effective as possible, you should prioritize your user’s needs. Make sure your site is easy to navigate, has a clear value proposition, and allows users to convert quickly.