Responsive Website Design made clear

We have been very busy in 2012 creating Responsive websites.

We think 2013 will see a dramatic increase in the number of websites built for desktop, tablet and mobile. 

What is Responsive Web Design you ask? A Responsive website is a single site that has been built to change its layout depending on the device it is displayed on. This means, testing websites as they are created on a variety of mobiles and tablet devices to ensure they display correctly. It also means that a designer will need to create a minimum of three layouts, one for desktop, one for mobile phones and one for tablets; creating three style sheets.

Is it more costly? Initially there is a little bit more work to do in setting up the themes, style sheets and layouts, however once these are done the build of the site is pretty much as before. However, the extra time spent on creating a responsive website will be worth the effort as your site will be accessed successfully on all devices without the need to zoom in.

Zooming, horizontal scrolling and navigation on a mobile phone that displays a desktop website is becoming a nuisance as more people want to access sites and read them more easily when they are out and about. Access to your site at all times is becoming more and more important.

What to look out for:

If you are looking for a designer to create a new responsive website for you, there are a few things to watch out for -

• Make sure the site loads quickly on desktop, mobile and tablet
• Make sure the site displays correctly on the smaller devices, sites that float around and show disjointed content are to be avoided
• be prepared to have less content display on mobiles, getting your message across is key
• check the code by right-clicking the site background (on desktop) this way if a site is not displaying correctly on mobile you may find that if a theme has been used it might be one to avoid

RWD is new technology and designers are learning how to create great websites that will perform everywhere.

Our first Responsive websites can be viewed here:

http://www.fusion-ipswich.co.uk

http://www.juliette-john.com

http://www.athelingtonhallweddings.co.uk

http://www.logcabinholidays.co.uk

http://www.csnilabour.org.uk

And more on the way

Soo