1. 225 N. Michigan Ave., 8th Floor, Chicago, IL 60601 | www.ResolutionMedia.com | (P) 312.980.1600
Responsive Web Design POV
A Good Start for Many (Not All) Businesses 4/24/13
Background
Since Ethan Marcotte popularized the idea of Responsive Web Design
with his article of the same name in 2010, the trend of responsive web
design has been on a tear in the web design world. Responsive web
design is the practice of using media queries, fluid grids and flexible
images to make the page readable regardless of what device is being
used to access it. In a digital age when multiscreen browsing is the norm,
and consumers are accessing content from smartphones, tablets,
desktops, televisions, and readers, responsive web design is often seen as
a solution to this fragmented environment.
Although it has been promoted since 2010, many in the SEO community
got behind the idea of responsive web design in June of 2012, when
Google announced that responsive web design is their preferred solution
for mobile SEO for smartphones. At Resolution we’ve been asked many
Figure 1 Mashable uses responsive design to serve the same content to different device types, all through
the same URL and without redirects.
2. 225 N. Michigan Ave., 8th Floor, Chicago, IL 60601 | www.ResolutionMedia.com | (P) 312.980.1600
times in the last two years if responsive web design is a good solution for
mobile SEO. The answer we give always depends on the business, and the
goals of the user.
Resolution POV:
Before you consider responsive design as a solution for your site, consider
these three points:
1) Look at your business. Responsive design is great for content-heavy
sites like blogs and news sites. Content is adaptive — in other words,
it does not change based on the device that’s accessing it.
As Content Strategist Karen McGrane pointed out, this leads to
fewer maintenance headaches as a result of content forking, which
is the practice of creating multiple articles that need to be updated
separately. With adaptive content and responsive web design,
content only needs to be updated once and will be resized based
on the device.
But if you have platform-specific content that’s necessary for your
business (e.g. downloads, games, etc.), responsive design might not
be the best solution for you.
2) Look at your consumer. Typically when a user is looking for
information in search engines, their search behavior will not change
from the desktop. A search for [jillian michaels] or [nate berkus], for
example, has about the same amount of searches (between 23-
27%) on mobile as desktop relative to demand for the keyword.
However, if we look at content queries, we can see that the intent
can be quite different. Only 1% of the 10,000 searches for [desktop
background] come from mobile devices, while 80% of the searches
for [mobile wallpaper] come from mobile devices.
3. 225 N. Michigan Ave., 8th Floor, Chicago, IL 60601 | www.ResolutionMedia.com | (P) 312.980.1600
3) Look at your site. In cases where responsive web design is not
appropriate for the demographic, it’s better to use dedicated URLs
or dynamic serving to provide a customized experience for mobile,
tablet and desktop users.
We’ve created a flowchart to help webmasters determine whether
responsive web design is appropriate for their sites, based on five
simple questions.
4. 225 N. Michigan Ave., 8th Floor, Chicago, IL 60601 | www.ResolutionMedia.com | (P) 312.980.1600
Summary
Responsive web design can be a fine solution for news sites and blogs that
primarily target users in the United States with smartphones, but it’s not for
every site all the time. Resolution has provided a flow chart to help our
clients decide whether responsive web design is the right design
methodology for their business. Using this tool can help them avoid the
user and SEO pitfalls that designing a responsive site for any other reason
but a positive user experience tends to create.
For more information, visit the resources below:
http://searchengineland.com/when-responsive-web-design-is-bad-for-
seo-149109
http://searchengineland.com/how-common-are-seo-problems-with-
responsive-web-design-152672
https://developers.google.com/webmasters/smartphone-sites/feature-
phones
https://developers.google.com/webmasters/smartphone-sites/
http://www.guypo.com/technical/responsive-web-design-is-bad-for-
performance-there-i-said-it/
For information about Resolution, visit our website:
www.resolutionmedia.com.
![225 N. Michigan Ave., 8th Floor, Chicago, IL 60601 | www.ResolutionMedia.com | (P) 312.980.1600
times in the last two years if responsive web design is a good solution for
mobile SEO. The answer we give always depends on the business, and the
goals of the user.
Resolution POV:
Before you consider responsive design as a solution for your site, consider
these three points:
1) Look at your business. Responsive design is great for content-heavy
sites like blogs and news sites. Content is adaptive — in other words,
it does not change based on the device that’s accessing it.
As Content Strategist Karen McGrane pointed out, this leads to
fewer maintenance headaches as a result of content forking, which
is the practice of creating multiple articles that need to be updated
separately. With adaptive content and responsive web design,
content only needs to be updated once and will be resized based
on the device.
But if you have platform-specific content that’s necessary for your
business (e.g. downloads, games, etc.), responsive design might not
be the best solution for you.
2) Look at your consumer. Typically when a user is looking for
information in search engines, their search behavior will not change
from the desktop. A search for [jillian michaels] or [nate berkus], for
example, has about the same amount of searches (between 23-
27%) on mobile as desktop relative to demand for the keyword.
However, if we look at content queries, we can see that the intent
can be quite different. Only 1% of the 10,000 searches for [desktop
background] come from mobile devices, while 80% of the searches
for [mobile wallpaper] come from mobile devices.](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)