One of the hottest topics in web marketing and indeed web business in general right now is that of when and if mobile will ultimately make desktop redundant. It’s the kind of thing that would have sounded completely ludicrous even just a couple of years ago, but there’s growing evidence to suggest that not only will mobile web traffic continue to dominate desktop over the years to come, but it will also leave little to no place for desktop whatsoever.
As far as those who firmly believe that this will be the case are concerned, now is already the time to begin thinking near-exclusively about mobile. Or in other words, they’re actively encouraging people to completely forget about the idea of building desktop websites and to instead build and operate just a single mobile site. Unsurprisingly, it’s a suggestion that has split the web business community right down the middle – some agreeing wholeheartedly, others writing it off as pure poppycock. Nevertheless, there are certain influential names in the game that tend to be listened to more than others when they make their voices heard. Suffice to say, Google pretty much tops the table when it comes to such voices, so it’s hardly surprising that when Google’s very own gurus stepped into the mix with their own thoughts, folk suddenly began taking the idea a lot more seriously.
“You definitely do not need a specific desktop website in addition to a mobile website,” said Google’s own John Mueller on this very subject.
For the time being, the simple fact of the matter is that there are way too many desktop web users – billions of them in fact – to make the decision to completely and permanently turn your back on them. It just doesn’t make any sense – especially given the fact that building and operating a standard desktop site is both relatively easy and affordable these days. As such, it’s probably safe to say that advice pushing the punters in the direction of complete desktop withdrawal can be put on the back-burner for the time being. Even if mobile really is destined to destroy desktop once and for all, it’s something that’s not going to happen for quite a while at least.
On the whole, it seems as if the subject has been taken somewhat out of context by a great many commentators and observers, taking a hard-lined stance on one side of the fence or the other. While it may appear that what Google is telling the world is that desktop no longer matters when compared to mobile, this really isn’t the case at all. Instead, what they’re actually advising is that the web world begins to shift its way of thinking in terms of priorities and indeed site development/operations.
Until now, it’s been a case of building a desktop site and optimising/modifying it as necessary to suit the mobile market. From now on, it’s going to be considerably more advisable and beneficial to flip things around – as in to focus on the mobile site primarily and make the necessary adjustments/optimisations to accommodate the desktop market…the new number-two.
