DudaMobile is one the leaders in building mobile websites for small businesses (SMBs). The company offers both DIY and DIFM programs and has
a partnership with Google to help accelerate small business adoption of mobile sites. Because the company builds mobile websites and is probably the single largest host of mobile sites for SMBs it has considerable insight into the state of SMB mobile adoption.
Yesterday the company released some new data showing that certain categories of SMBs were starting to adopt mobile sites. More on those data in a minute; first some context.
Most Enterprises Still Not Mobile Ready
Google said roughly a year ago that, among its top advertisers, 79 percent “weren’t ready to engage mobile customers.” The number has probably improved since then (see postscript below for updated figures) but the majority of enterprises are still not “mobile ready.” Then there are those companies doing mobile advertising that still aren’t mobile ready.
Consider, for example, the fairly representative case of the following display ad and landing page from investment firm Fidelity. This ad was captured on the AP mobile app roughly a week ago. We can put it into the “what were they thinking?” category.
Among other things this ad has no call to action and the landing page is the firm’s PC website. While Fidelity might get some brand exposure out of this campaign (though that’s probably not the intent exactly), it is certainly not going to get much engagement, let alone leads.
Mobile Sites Generate 75 Percent More Engagement
Google has reported that mobile-friendly sites produce 75 percent higher rates of engagement (revenue, page views, etc.) per visit for mobile users than PC pages like the one above. It’s easy to see why.
In February of this year a Mongoose Metrics analysis of 1 million websites found that only 9 percent were mobile ready. And a Restaurant Sciences restaurant internet marketing study from Q1 this year found that “only 5 percent of independent restaurants have a mobile website.”
Some SMB Categories Doing Better
DudaMobile’s data show that at least for the restaurant (and food) category — restaurants are by far the number one local-mobile search heading — things may be improving. Certain categories of businesses are now developing mobile sites at increasing rates.
According to the data the company released here’s the SMB mobile sites “leaderboard.” This list reflects the percentage of all SMB websites that are concentrated in the heading or category:
Consider that in excess of 30 percent of searches for restaurants are now from mobile devices (for Yelp its 40 percent). In addition, more than 20 percent of hotel-related search queries are now coming from mobile.
Mobile Sites/Campaigns Generate Calls
DudaMobile also reported that mobile websites generate high call volumes. This is one of the primary ways that mobile users contact businesses — for relatively obvious reasons — yet a majority of mobile marketers still aren’t doing call tracking.
According to the DudaMobile data, nearly 20 percent of visits to a mobile-optimized website result in an immediate call to the business.” However mobile ad network xAd found that among “secondary actions” (following a click to a landing page) call volumes are typically very high. In the company’s Q1 mobile “performance stats” report it found huge call volumes in categories such as travel.
In the graphic below calls represented 73 percent of secondary actions (from a landing page) for people searching for car rentals. And for those searching for airline information, calls were almost 90 percent of secondary actions.
The implications of these data are obvious: have a mobile-optimized presence (whether dedicated or responsive web design) and optimize for phone calls. Earlier this week Google told me that the company’s Click-to-Call ads were generating 15 million calls on a monthly basis, up from 10 million less than six months ago.
Postscript: Google sent me a note, saying that on a global basis the “not mobile ready” number is now 62 percent. So companies are making progress. The 79 percent figure cited above was from “Americas” markets apparently.
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