eMarketer, a New York-based market research firm reported in December that adults now spend more time each day with their mobile devices than with print media. We love our mobile phones and tablets…and this is a love affair that is still in its infancy.
That should wake you up no matter what time of day you are reading this. Actually, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone when you look around your morning routine anymore. What are people doing on the subway or the bus during their morning commute? What are drivers doing at stoplights? What are people in the coffee shop doing while they wait for their latte? What are people doing when they eat lunch? For that matter, what are people doing when they take a few minutes to use the restroom? We are interacting with our mobile phones and tablets.
Americans spend on average 48 minutes with newspapers and magazines each day, while they spend 65 minutes with their mobile devices. That is over an hour spent looking down at a roughly four-inch screen. Sure, we are checking their email. We are checking into Facebook, or Twitter, or even Foursquare. Not only are we looking at our mobile devices while we are out and about during the day, we are multi-tasking at home as well. Over 60% of Americans spend time online while watching TV. From our mobile phones to our tablets to our laptops, we are checking emails, our friend’s Facebook status, or maybe your website…..or can we?
We’ve talked before about the coming day when more websites are accessed by mobile devices than by desktop devices.
We’ve talked about the looming demise of Flash animation. Most importantly, we’ve talked about making sure your website is mobile friendly. That doesn’t mean you need two versions of your website, though for some that might be the right answer. For Eye Care Professionals, you need to make sure your website is visible on the most amount of devices, from speedy quad-core desktops to the millions of iPhone 3’s out there.
You need to make sure your links work correctly. You need to make sure users can press a link on your website that will dial your practice on their mobile phone. I know, this isn’t a simple free thing you can do. More than likely you will need to pay your favorite local web developer (or us if you are looking for one) to update your site. If you put off making these changes, rest assured your competitor won’t.
Daniel Feldman, is a co-founder to the Visionaries Group visionariesgroup.com or on Facebook and CEO of dba Communications dbadesigns.com, a web design and social media firm specializing in helping eye care practices achieve success.
