One of the biggest changes in web design in recent years has been the emergence of responsive web design. In the past we explained what responsive sites are, but there are still some questions about why they are important. The two biggest reasons why they are important are Google and the end user.

In early 2015 Google announced a change in their search algorithm to start including how responsive a site is in their rankings. What this means is that if your site isn’t responsive, you could very well begin to see a drop in your google ranking; thus making it more difficult for users to find your site. Google has said that they will only be including these response criteria in their rankings when a user is on a mobile device (smart phones or tablets) but I would not be surprised if they were to start including them on desktop searches soon as well.

Even if Google doesn’t start including the responsive criteria in desktop search, responsive sites are still needed because of the end user – your customers and prospective customers. I’ve heard some people argue that they don’t see the need for a responsive site because they don’t use mile devices for web browsing. The problem with that argument is that they are in the minority on the issue. Over two thirds of Americans currently own a smartphone and of those two thirds, 60% use their smartphone as their primary web browsing device with nearly half saying they won’t return to a site if it doesn’t load properly on the device. A website is, at the end of the day, there to benefit the user, not necessarily the business. We always stress that we need to do certain things on a website and with it’s design to enhance the user experience. Responsive sites are simply the next step in that tradition.

If you’d like to learn more about responsive sites or get started on getting a responsive site set up, please get in touch with us today.