When I was presenting at North East Expo 2010 earlier this week, a couple of people asked me how easy it was to get a mobile version of their website developed. There are many good web designers and companies out there who can build your existing website code to be adaptable for mobile deceives.
In fact, I was listening to the wonderful Simon Collison speak at Hull Digital Live last week, Simon happens to be one of the most respected website designers in the UK. His talk was all about considering designing adaptive systems in website design layouts/ structure and how they should be flexible and adaptable for mobile devices.
A Mobile website is certainly something all of us should be considering in the future.
The Future is Mobile – Key Stats
- 41% of retailers plan to have a transactional mobile site or application in place within the next year – eDigital Research commissioned by AIME/IAB/IMRG, August 2010.
- 7.1 million Brits now access the internet through their mobile phones – Internet Monitor Survey, Kantar Media, September 2010
Tools to Create a Mobile Site
I’ve listed some awesome tools to create your first mobile website.
WP Touch
Many of my readers are WordPress users themselves and WordPress is something we at Smartdog use for nearly all of our clients who are looking for web development. WPTouch is a free plugin that allows you to create a mobile version of your existing Wordpress content very quickly and easily, there is also a paid version (see image above) allowing for further advanced customisation.
Mofuse
Mofuse pricing starts from just $7.79 a month! It is a popular mobile website builder which offers users some excellent customisation and features. To setup a mobile website it is simple and easy to use, even for those less technical. For those who are bloggers, MoFuse is free and even easier to set up. You can also measure you mobile site through Mofuse, those of you who are consider taking your content further to say, the Apple App Store. Mofuse will help you create a mobile web app for iPhone as well.
Mobify
Mobify allows you to get your website to look great on thousands of mobile devices. Mobify will sort out the optimisation of images, media and styles by using DeviceAtlas, the leading mobile device database. All you have to do is design the mobile view, they will take care of the rest! There is also mobile analytics and CMS plugins to use your content from your favorite CMS be it WordPress, Drupal or Joomla. You can also choose a custom domain or choose to have the mobile site self-hosted.
mobiSiteGalore
mobiSiteGalore is a mobile website builder that allows you to easily build, publish & share a full-fledged mobile website that is guaranteed to work fine on any mobile phone.
- No technical knowledge required
- Nothing to download or Install
- Build with Mobile or computer
- Guaranteed to work on any mobile phone
- Add Forms, Sell via mobile, Show Ads
Google Website Optimiser
Google Mobile Optimiser is completely free to use and is one of the quickest way to convert any existing website into a mobile friendly version. Supply Google Mobile optimiser with your URL and it will automatically optimise the website for mobiles phones. This is done by removing the site header, ads and resizing all image contents so they can display correctly. You are not required to sign up by Google to use this service and the complete job is done on the go.
It does a basic job well, just don’t expect any flashy design or the ability to add custom colour schemes, layout etc.
Rember, you don’t have to pay a fortune for a mobile website and don’t let anyone try and sell you one different. Please let other people considering a mobile version of their website know about this blog post. Thank you to the lovely lady who asked me ‘how do I get a mobile version of my website’ this blog post is for you.
