Have you looked at your website in your mobile browser lately?

If it looks a little uncomfortable, all squished in that tiny screen, it might be time to contemplate redesigning your site for mobile users.

If you aren’t providing your mobile users a great experience, they’ll be bouncing off to greener pastures as soon as they hit your website on their smartphone or tablet – costing you many opportunities.

The International Data Corporation (IDC) forecasts that “by 2015, more U.S. Internet users will access the Internet through mobile devices than through PCs or other wireline devices.”

Smartphones and tablets have opened the door for job seekers to be connected to their job search all hours of the day and night, whether they are at home, at work, or in transit.

Here are a few tips for enhancing your mobile website experience for candidates and clients:

1.  Keep the goal of your redesign in mind. Now may be a good time to embark upon a mobile redesign, but without a purpose, your efforts can fall off track.

Do you want to capture candidate info while they are in the process of researching new opportunities?  Do you want to make it easy for candidates or clients to contact your firm directly from their smartphone? Do you want to convert candidates to applicants while they are browsing on their tablet?

Having a specific outcome of the redesign in mind enables you to measure your ROI and tweak your design for improvement in the future.

2.  Reach your audience.  With so many different devices on the market, it is almost impossible to be compatible with them all.

Your web analytics can help you and your design team see where your traffic is coming from, and weigh your options when it comes to device/OS compatibility.  If 95% of your mobile visitors are visiting from their Blackberry, it doesn’t make sense to invest in making your mobile site compatible with Windows phone.

Your traffic source can help you determine if you want to build a native app, a web app, or make your webdesign scalable so that it will fit small mobile screens.
 

3.  Get out your mop and broom.  When designing for mobile, keep in mind that you have a lot less real estate to work with, so everything on the site should have a clear purpose.

Mobile design should be clean, simple, and touch-friendly.  Transform tiny links into big fat buttons for big fat fingers.

Limit choices and lessen clicks from point A to point B.  Make finding a solution (are you a candidate looking for jobs, or a client looking for services?) easy.

If you want to gather candidate information, don’t present them with a never-ending list of input fields (will name and email suffice to start the conversation?). Keep it simple.

What is the biggest barrier between you and a mobile-friendly website?