Producing a responsive web design for your company’s website will let you tap various groups of audiences to visit your website. A responsive website allows different users with different devices to access the internet reach your site. It will become compatible for any resolution, operating system, and device type. It is crucial that you consider responsive web design to provide the best user experience for your website visitor, coming from any device.
Search engine optimization plays a huge role in transitioning your website design into a responsive one. With Google focusing on its mobile-first index, having a responsive and mobile-ready website can give you numerous benefits in ranking up in the search engine results pages.
Why Responsive Web Design?
Responsive web design means that you are making your website adaptable and compatible with any of your visitors’ device. No matter how wide or how small the device is, the users can still access your site with ease. It will automatically load according to the specifications of the devices so that the users will not have a hard time adjusting it for their viewing.
It is better for companies to capitalize on this current situation by adopting a responsive web design. Google even recommends taking the extra effort because it is easier for them to share your site’s content, it is compatible with Google’s current algorithm, and it will require you less time in monitoring than maintaining multiple pages for a single content.
Here are five SEO benefits you can get after following a responsive web design.
1. Enhanced Site Usability
If you have static web design, chances are your users are not staying in your website for a long time because of the hassle they are experiencing when navigating through your page. Google uses the data from your customer’s time spent on site to know if you have a high-quality website.
Adopting to responsive design will improve usability metrics such as average time of stay which indicates users time consumed on a single page, and this signifies excellent user experience, which will be converted as a positive ranking signal to rank up in Google’s search results.
This positive change will also give you higher conversion rates and increased customer satisfaction, which you should always be aware of. Good site usability and user interface can skyrocket your customer conversion rates, so it makes a considerable investment to adopt it.
2. Quicker Loading Speed
Speed is one of the most significant factors in Google’s SEO rankings. Along with the introduction of the mobile-first index, it is also announced that page loading speed will become a significant indicator on the site’s ranking on search engine result pages.
Having a responsive web design will have you a faster page loading speed because it automatically makes your pages as condensed as possible, without compromising the site’s quality. Your pages will become smaller in size, which makes it very easy to load.
Accelerated mobile pages or AMPs are present in the debates about what can make your site load faster. However, incorporating AMPs is only available for static websites, so might as well change your whole site into a responsive one instead of improving just one part of it.
If you want to measure your loading speed, there are sites like GTMetrix and Google Page Loading Speed Tool to check and address essential sections on your page.
3. Lower Bounce Rate
Having a responsive web design can lower your traffic exits and decrease your bounce rate percentage. Instead of your users bouncing out because of poor interface and experience, your visitors would appreciate the knowledge and stay longer using their device.
However, bounce rates still depend on what kind of site you have. Different sites have different aims, which in result gives different duration your users visit your site. Blog pages have the highest bounce rates amongst content sites and while service sites have the least bounce rate. Another factor that makes bounce rate of sites different from one another is its design. If your site showcases good content, but the design prevents the user from enjoying it, they may still bounce out of your site.
Though still being contested, low bounce rate can result in a higher SERP ranking by Google because of the high overall experience that you are offering to your visitors. As the bounce rate is connected to many things such as website architecture, content and many more SEO related factors.
4. Fewer Duplicate Content
Google always penalizes website with duplicate contents. If you have a separate site for mobile and desktop, Google will undoubtedly see it as the same content and will automatically penalize you for it. Incorporating a responsive web design for your site will make all changes into one and will not give you any more hassle in making different sites for different platforms.
Additionally, duplicated content can negatively influence your rankings. You need to ensure that your content is indexed and make it clear to Google that those two sites are the same. But to lessen these kinds of issues, you can start building a responsive web design.
5. Improved Social Sharing
Social media is another ally of websites in growing traffic and gaining new audiences. However, social media does not positively affect your rankings in search engine result pages, but it can give you a vast number of unique visitors to your site.
A higher website traffic rate can give you more top rankings because Google reads it as more engagement to your audience, which can lead to higher brand visibility and brand awareness. This is all because of having a responsive design that makes it easier to share pages and articles on different social media platforms.
Now that you know its benefits, we hope that you will at least consider shifting to responsive web design. It has the potential to bring your website a lot of traffic, as well as a giving your site visitors a better user experience which will encourage them to stay longer and come back for more.
About the Author
Kenneth Sytian is the CEO of Sytian Productions, one of the leading web design services company in the Philippines. He has been designing websites and developing web apps for more than a decade. He is considered as one of the top influencers in web design and development.
