With mobile browsing growing in the US, how do you adapt?
A recent comScore report shows that mobile browsing is growing very rapidly in the US.
The report segments phones based on either the user having a Smartphone or a Touchscreen device. The touchscreen devices are growing at three times the speed of Smartphones, based on mobile subscribers.
In the past year touchscreen devices have grown 159% alone, from 9.2 to 23 million users. The iPhone is obviously leading the way with a 39% share of users, this is expected as it has the best mobile browsing at this time. Following behind is the LG Dare (8.7%), and another LG in third is the Voyager (7.8%). The Blackberry Storm (7%) makes it in fourth, while the Palm Treo (6.5%) somehow manages to make it in fifth. Honnestly, who uses Palm’s anymore? Well actually I’m pretty excited about the Palm Pre but the Iphone is still better.
What good is this information to me?
Well, it’s time to start thinking about mobile browsing, and possibly creating your own mobile website. Thankfully there are a few solutions already dedicated to wordpress users.
Feedburner offers a simple script which fetches your last few posts (user defined) and display them on a page. It’s only one tiny piece of script, so just as long as your mobile browser has Javascript enabled, it will work smoothly.
While researching this article though, I found the holy grail of Wordpress plugins for mobile browsing. It was very easy to install and looks marvelous on my iPhone. (check out my website on your mobile to see the plugin in action). The WP mobile plugin by Alex King. I mean this plugin is a one stop shop, it takes all the work out of having to create a mobile detection script, the theme (which is the mobile Carrington theme) and every other bit which would be very time consuming to create.
I cannot recommend this plugin enough if your website is relevant to people who may want to browse it through their mobile device.
Real question though: How would you promote your blog to mobile users?
I just got my first smart phone (blackberry storm) last week and I was wondering how to get my website to work better for mobile phones. This was a very helpful post.
carl
6 Nov 09 at 5:13 pm
Have you ever tried Mobile Press?
DJ
7 Nov 09 at 3:17 am
I’m not ready to use the WP plugin yet but I might have to resort to that at some point. At a minimum, all I want to do is respond to comments on my blogs.
Gabe | freebloghelp.com
9 Nov 09 at 10:28 am
@Gabe,
This is for a mobile version of your blog, I’m not sure about mobile blog management software. It would be safe to assume that there is some available on the iPhone.
@DJ,
I was about to test it, but I went with WP mobile myself. I’ll have to check your website on my phone then.
Justin
10 Nov 09 at 8:56 am
Mobile plugins for iPhones work great too! It’s certainly a platform one needs to focus on.
Barbara Ling, Virtual Coach
11 Nov 09 at 4:44 am