Your business can be easy to find with a mobile website.  

Potential customers are trying to find you by using local searches on their mobile devices; if you don’t have a mobile friendly website, those customers are likely to find your competitor first.  This is especially true for restaurants.

 According to a 2012 Google study, 92% of US smartphone users use internet search engines to find local businesses.

89% of them have taken action (such as call, visit, or buy) shortly after finding a local source for the service or product.  Furthermore, 82% of them say they perform a phone search once a week or more, so they provide a lot of search traffic.  An impressive 48% of smartphone users say they have visited a local business they found on the mobile web.

The top category for local searches is restaurants.  

They have the most to gain from being easy to find on a mobile website.  How often have you heard “you decide” as you consider going to a restaurant with someone?  If you don’t know all the restaurants in that area, your smart phone can show a list of them or a map of them with flag markers.  The probability that you will choose a restaurant that shows up on the map is very high, especially if you can click a flag and see mobile friendly information.

If you have any kind of retail or service establishment that people visit in person, you should have a mobile website that makes you easy to find.  There is no reason not to capitalize on the trend in local searches to put money in your pocket.

Prices for simple mobile websites start at just a few hundred dollars.

Give us a call at 317-299-5150 and get mobile today!

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Premier Capital Corporation serves as one of Indiana’s leading certified development companies accredited by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA).  They work as a partner with bankers and business owners to provide small business loans via long-term financing for real estate, machinery and equipment.

In order to make it easier for people to compare small business loans, they developed a calculator on their website that produced estimated payments using their SBA 504 loan program.   That worked well for a number of years.  However, with the recent growth of mobile internet access and mobile device usage, Premier decided they needed a mobile version also.  

In cooperation with Provim, an Indianapolis mobile web developer, the team created a  mobile website that was recently launched and enthusiastically received.   If you have a mobile device with scanner, you can scan this image and see it for yourself.    

Here are some of the features that make it so popular:

• it is a branded mobile site with custom colors and logo
• simple, finger-sized buttons make it easy to use
• the calculator visually leads you through the inputs
• one touch comparison results for 504 loan versus a  7a loan
• one button “send pdf” emails the loan structure and payments
• home page has “save to phone” button
• all staff members are shown on one page linked to individual pages

Staff members particularly like these additional features:

• every staff member has their own page with photo
• one-touch to dial for their direct phone number
• every staff member has a unique QR code to their page for their business cards
• one touch “download my contact info” for each staff member

This project is a great example of using an opportunity to think big.  Instead of just recreating the calculator on a smaller screen, they created a unique mobile tool that improves their work flow and appeals to the new crowd of mobile users.

If you are thinking about moving into the mobile generation, give us a call and let us suggest some things.  You may be surprised what we can do for your business!

ProVim and TodaysQR

317-299-5150 (or) 847-0302

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If you are considering starting up a mobile website, there are three mobile options available to you.  This article will help you understand the differences between them before you decide which way to go.

The three mobile options are a responsive website, a mobile application, and a mobile website.  Here is some quick information about each of the options.

• A responsive website has additional code causes it to adapt the mobile device.  You can keep your existing website but it will display the same content differently on a 3 inch phone and a 17 inch laptop.  This allows you to maintain your content in only one location and it doesn’t take a lot of time to add the code.  However, users may find it slower because of the amount of content to download and there is limited ability to use attractive mobile features.  Designing a responsive site to work properly on every mobile device, browser and operating system can be complicated. 

• A mobile app (application) is a program that a user must find and download onto their device.  It performs specific functions quickly and effectively, so many companies use them.  Apps require users to download each update also, which can be frustrating for mobile users.  Apps are generally more expensive than the other two options, and they must be approved for distribution prior to launching them.

• A mobile website is a streamlined customer experience for mobile users.  Mobile sites are fast loading and incorporate attractive features such as one-touch to dial, one-touch to map, and easy downloading of contact information.  This type of site can be a single landing page or many pages so the cost and development time can be low for simple sites.  Since the user must have internet access to get to the website, a poor signal can slow down the site.  Updates made to the site are immediately available with no user activity required.

Before you decide on the option for your mobile presence, you should decide on the goals you want to achieve with it, and then consult with developers to get more ideas and information.

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QR (quick response) codes are gaining in popularity as more and more mobile internet users scan them on their mobile devices; however, many of them are not being used properly.   The tips for using QR codes below can help you get better results with your codes and avoid costly mistakes.

Step 1 – Plan the full action cycle before you publish.

• Spend some time thinking through what result you want the codes to achieve.   Start by determining a few specific actions you want taken by people when they scan them, such as calling you on the phone, or sending in their email address to get a coupon, or watching a video about your service.  
• Next think of something of value to reward them for taking that action.  It has to be significant enough (in their mind) to get them to do it.  
• Finally think about your internal system’s response to their action.  You might send them a coupon, or call them to set up an appointment, or  mail them a brochure.   You also need to plan for saving details of the interaction so that you can follow up later. 

Step 2 – Design the experience for the user.

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When mobile visitors search for a product or service, they’re looking for key information: 

• contact: phone number/email
• directions
• store hours
• product/service information.  

Mobile-friendly websites make that information easy to find, with prominent buttons that are finger-sized for easy navigation.  Most regular websites don’t work well on mobile devices because the content is hard to read or difficult to navigate, so mobile users get frustrated and go elsewhere.

Mobile users are different than desktop users, because they are more active.

• They may be in their vehicle or a coffee shop looking for key information so they can go there right now.   
• Mobile users are action-takers.  90% of mobile searches result in some form of action, such as calling the business, visiting it, or making a purchase on-line.
• Mobile users are generally close to making a purchase and looking for final information before they pull the trigger.
• According to Google, 67% say they are more likely to make a purchase on a mobile friendly site.  Also, nearly three quarters of mobile  users have made a purchase based on information from their phones.

If you are thinking about building one of these, you need these must-haves to make it effective.  The info-graphic below contains good explanations, and we build all of those features into every site we create.  We’ve built a lot of them and can build a great one for you!

If you would like help designing and creating a mobile website, give us a call today at 317-299-5150.  

The info graphic was published by DemandForce in partnership with Column Five.

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With more than 6 billion mobile users of smartphones and other devices in the world, a good number of them must be looking for a business like yours.  Marketers have  seen these trends:

• the number and dollar volume of mobile purchases is increasing
• mobile users frequently do local searches to find a source close by their location
• after finding a source, mobile users act quickly by calling, visiting, or buying on-line
• mobile users have a very short attention span 
• mobile users will not waste time on a non-friendly website

About 400 million mobile devices are active in the US, and sales continue to soar.  This chart shows that over half of those users go online often, and usage is expected to increase.  

If your business does not have a mobile-friendly website to attract them, you are missing many potential customers who will find your competitors before you.   

Let us help you join the Mobile Era.  Prices start at just a few hundred dollars, so they are very affordable, and because of their simple content. it usually doesn’t take long to build one.  We have created many of them, and we’d like to help you with yours.

Give us a call at 299-5150 or email us at info@todaysqr.com.

Source: Pew Internet’s study of US adults, “Cell Internet Use 2012”

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Computer sales have been decreasing for the last 4 quarters, while sales of mobile devices (smart phones, tablets, ipads, etc.) have been skyrocketing.   Know what that means? It means that many more people are going to be looking for mobile friendly websites.  

You need to get one now, before it’s too late!

Your website can be viewed on a smartphone, but that doesn’t make it mobile-friendly.  I come across lots of web pages that fit on my 3 inch phone screen, but I would have to zoom in with my fingers to see the data.   If I can’t click on your phone number to dial it, or easily see a map to visit your office, I’m just not going to call you.  Unless you are the only source for what I need, I’ll go to someone easier to contact.  How many potential customers like me are you losing this week?

Give us a call at 317-299-5150 to get your mobile site!

  This information published by DemandForce in partnership with Column Five.

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Business owners have known for years that they needed a listing in the phone book so that people could find them.  They paid a lot of money for the ads believing it brought them business because people regularly used the phone book.

Is the Phone Book Dead?

Today’s leaders have to decide whether to continue paying for phone book ads, as well as paying to create and maintain their website.  Part of that decision is their belief about how many people use the phone directory, and how many people use web search engines such as Google or Yahoo.

It is not easy to find out how many people still use the phone book to find businesses, but we can consider our own behavior and that of families and friends as a guide.  In my case, we haven’t kept a telephone book in years, even though they are delivered several times a year.  We always recycle them immediately because they are too slow to use.  I have heard others say the same thing, so I believe the use of them phone books is low.  As for search engines, I probably do at least 2-3 every day and some days do many more.   Is your experience similar?

It is much easier to measure traffic that comes from internet search engines, and even to divide it up by desktop computers and mobile devices.  There are several reliable analytic packages available that can be added to a website to get the information, as well as a lot of completed research you can use today.   Mobile users are clearly strong in this area.  According to a 2012 Google study, 92% of smart phone users use internet search engines to find local businesses, and 89% of them have taken action after finding a local source of what they are seeking.  For other types of ads,  phone tracking software can show you exactly who is calling you from any particular source.  There are a lot of tools to help you.

If you doubt the value of continuing your phone book ad, we can help you make the decision.  By adding the right analytics tools to your website, you can get the data you need.

Give us a call today at 317-299-5150.

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The best thing about technology is that it can overcome business problems for us. It takes a little creativity, and often another set of eyes, but it’s worth searching for an answer.  Let’s take a look at some examples.

Spread Your Contact Info - You want people to call you, but let’s be honest — almost nobody is going type all of your contact information into their phone.  However, you can use technology to make it easier for them to call.  By using a mobile friendly page, they can  download and save it in seconds with the push of a button.  When that technology is linked from your business card, it becomes the perfect way to solve this problem.

Making things easier for smartphone users is just part of good customer service.  Gary Huff and the fine people at Premier Capital Corp used this technology to overcome business problems they faced.

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During the last six months of 2012, 41% of all email was read on mobile devices, which equates to hundreds of billions of emails.  The information came from a report published by Knotice, of Akron OH.

This means that people are opening the messages on the go, which is sooner than if they only read them at their desk, but it also could result in negative effects for the sender.  If your email has a link to your website but your site is not mobile ready, they are likely to be annoyed and get a negative impression of your brand.

According to Google, companies without a good mobile site drive 61% of mobile traffic to their competitors.   Can you afford to lose that many of the people who are trying to get your information on their mobile device?

Make sure that every ad you run and every email you send will take viewers to a good web experience regardless of what device they are using.  A smart site is programmed to recognize the device before it sees the page, and to send the best display for that device.  With billions of mobile users in the world, you can’t afford not to have one!

ProVim offers mobile site development beginning at just a few hundred dollars.

Call us today and let us create one for you!   http://provim.net/mobile/

(317) 299-5150

“Don’t penalize users for visiting your site on smaller devices.”  – Brad Frost, Responsive web leader and publisher

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