Guest blog article by Jennifer Landry, web journalist and small business owner.
Visual Customer Service in the Social Age
Over half of American adults currently own a smartphone, and 29% of cell phone owners describe their phones as something they can’t imagine living without. The need for smartphone-catered web design and brand-customer interaction is greater than ever and is only growing steadily as smartphones become more prevalent and consumers demand further simplicity and ease of use.
Mobile Ease of Use
Optimizing landing pages for your existing or potential new customers mobile devices is essential to providing a comfortable and easy to use method for interacting with your brand, product, or service while the consumer is out and about, surfing the web on their mobile devices. While some mobile devices such as tablets do well with fully loaded desktop browser destinations, smartphones (though they keep getting bigger) are better suited for mobile optimized sites. Here are just a few ways you can optimize a landing page for mobile devices.
- First make sure to clear the clutter. A mobile landing page should hold all essential information in an easy to read and find format, without the extraneous information that a desktop page might have. Simplicity here is key.
- Remember that the average attention span and expected waiting time is far shorter for a mobile user than a desktop one. Your customers are on the go and want information and access as quickly as possible. Make sure not to overload your mobile site with complex scripts or graphics that may delay the loading time of the page.
- What would seem an obvious optimization is not always followed; be sure that your landing page doesn’t require zooming on mobile. This is an integral part of making it easy to navigate for your customers. Make the information available in straightforward one page manner.
The Visual World
A mobile optimized site is a requirement for the modern visually driven consumer. While we know visual content performs better when it comes to advertising as well as content sharing, the same goes for a customer service experience. Customers overwhelmingly have more positive experiences with brand interactions if they are visual-heavy and not based too much in text. Check out this infographic “Visual Customer Service in the Social Age” for a breakdown of how consumers are responding to visual content, and how brands are using a variety of visual services and platforms to extend and enhance the customer service experience.
About Jennifer Landry
Jennifer Landry is a web journalist based in Malibu, California. She specializes in articles about business management and the current social media landscape, which are inspired by her own small business experience.
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