The success of your hotel’s online marketing depends on one simple truth: You need to have a mobile-friendly website in order to succeed.
So, what is mobile-friendly design? The simplest definition is that it is a website whose information has been adapted to be easily viewed across a wide spectrum of platforms, particularly on the small displays of mobile phones and tablets.
If your hospitality business is to make inroads in the cut-throat online space, it is vital that you embrace the needs of mobile users and optimize your website for smartphones, or else you will be left wondering where all of your guests went. (Hint? They went to your competitors with a mobile-friendly website!)
What Is The Importance Of A Mobile Friendly Website?
1. It Offers a Better User Experience
If someone receives a link via text message, opens it and is presented with a jumble of unintelligible garbage instead of your website, you will have absolutely no chance of converting them from lookers to bookers. Additionally, any user that is unable to easily browse or read the information on your website will not only leave uninspired, but they will have a negative perception of the service they can expect from your hotel.
2. Visitors Spend More Time on Your Website
As with everything that exists online, time is of the essence. You have very little time to capture people’s attention, a situation that is made even critical in the case of users who access the internet on the go on their mobile devices. Making it easier for them to navigate your web pages and access mobile-friendly content layouts will improve the chances that they will make a booking.
3. The Website Loads Faster
Mobile download times are a vital factor when it comes to your hotel’s bottom line. When looking for the booking page on your website, visitors will expect to have a similar browsing experience on their mobile devices as they do on their desktop computers with regard to speed. Even if a user is willing to wait (or not) for pages to load, they will have a negative opinion of your hotel.
4. Search Engines Love Them
Search engines love mobile websites. In fact, in April 2015, Google rolled out an update to their ranking algorithm, improving results for websites which are mobile-friendly. The move was a significant interpretation for every website since search engines are now designed to reward mobile-friendly sites and penalize non-responsive websites.
5. They Give Your Hotel a Competitive Edge over the Competition
There is a good chance that a good number of hotels operating in your vicinity are already ahead of the game, having beautifully mobile-optimized websites. However, there are still many businesses that are not yet to appreciate the advantage a mobile-friendly design offers. Building a responsive website will give your hotel a leg up over the competition.
Conclusion
When a user browsing the internet on their mobile phone abandons a hotel website because it lacks mobile optimization, loads slowly, or has poor web page design, they head straight to the competition. Besides the booking process, travelers have now come to expect hotel websites to provide specialized mobile services that include check-in, quick access to customer service, and reliable booking process.
