

Principles of Mobile Site Design: Delight Users and Drive Conversions - twapi
http://www.google.com/think/multiscreen/whitepaper-sitedesign.html

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beloch
26\. Never ask users to download an app to do what they could do on your
website.

27\. Your mobile and full sites should have similar layouts, so users used to
one won't get lost on the other.

28\. Content/functions on your main website should also be available on your
mobile website. Otherwise, users will search for things that aren't there and
become very, very, angry.

29\. Avoid using popups as they are harder to close on mobile devices.
(Really, you shouldn't be using them on your desktop site either.) It is
especially dumb for popups to ask a user to fill out a survey on their
satisfaction with your site before they've started using it.

30\. Switching to the full site should be easy and obvious. Do not attempt to
thwart this functionality.

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dredmorbius
#9 Explore before they commit -- is truly ironic given the experience of going
to G+ on any mobile device.

#10 Purchase as guest -- dittos -- allow for anonymous (or unauthenticated)
transactions.

The principles are actually pretty good, but it's clear Google's left hand
doesn't know what its right it suggesting.

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lnanek2
Presentation giving some sort of error for reaching the download limit of non-
Google Docs format presentations.

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kbar13
I would assume that Google has a way to remove that limit for their own usage,
right?

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peterkelly
I'd like to propose a 26th principle:

Don't place a bandwidth limit on files that aren't in google docs format.

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peterkelly
Ok so it's loaded now.

I just tried it on my iPhone. This has to be the least mobile-friendly blog
post I've seen in a very long time.

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usingpond
Cool, always glad to read an article on design from a company that barely
understands it.

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copergi
I love that those of us who give a shit about the users can use the mobile
trend to push good user-centric design on otherwise unwilling marketing
weasels. I just wish they would stop pretending it is in any way unique to
mobile users. Almost all that stuff is just ordinary "give the user a site
that doesn't suck", and applies to any user, regardless of the device they are
using at any particular moment. "Make your menu simple" and "give relevant
search results" and "don't put up registration walls to prevent your users
from giving you money" have been well known for over a decade. Take this
opportunity to push good web design for your entire site, not just for mobile
users.

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dredmorbius
Most of it reads as Jacob Nielsen 1998. You're quite right.

One of the things I actually like about mobile websites (done right) is that
they make for better _desktop_ websites: they take away all of the cruft far
too typical of the latter and get straight to business.

Someone should make a point of taking mobile redesign as a launching point for
_desktop_ redesign.

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camus2
That's what the mobile first approach is about.Get rid of the fat and focus on
what matters.

It doesnt always work though,sometime user facing sites have complex
requirements that just dont make sense on mobile,you often need 2 versions
with a complete different UI.

Yet i dont believe in a high rate conversion on mobile web(phones). native
apps often work better when it comes to ad or even ecommerce. Especially when
"in app" purchase is just one click ahead.

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dredmorbius
I realize you can't get rid of _everything_ (and sometimes mobile sites cut
too much), but there's very few sites which can't go on _some_ diet.

I've written CSS rules to modify over 1000 sites in the past year, and while
the modifications are often minor, the busier the site, the more likely I'll
simply strip out elements -- asides, headers, and footers are very likely to
get killed, leaving more space and prominence for primary content.

Yes, I could use Pocket or Readability, but they work an article at a time.
This fixes the site for good.

