Websites for Mobile Devices

The mobile web is a growing market sector and any company who do not have a mobile enabled version of their website are missing out on good and ever increasing numbers of potential clients. An Ofcom report of March this year showed that around 12% of all website visits come from mobile browsers and this is a big increase on the previous year, a fact that fits the statistics we get from Analytics reports from our own and clients' websites. Around 40% of all adults use their mobile phone to browse the Internet some of the time and this figure rises to over 70% for 16-25 age group.

So what are the key points to consider?

• Apple devices (iPhone, iPad, iPod) currently have by far the biggest share of the mobile web market
• If you have any Flash on your site these devices do not show it (without a bit of jiggery-pokery)
• Mobile screens are generally smaller so a mobile enabled website should take this into account
• Mobile users do not generally want pages and pages of content but a simple site with key information
• Mobile phones allow people to ring direct from your website with a simple click if coded correctly

How is a mobile website constructed? There area few options:

1. Responsive design, where a website stylesheet will respond to the device and/or screen size to serve a version of the site that fits the device screen and may even hide some content for mobile devices like tadwebsolutions.co.uk
2. A completely different version of the site served on a special domain such as tadweb.mobi
3. A completely different version that is automatically served to mobile devices on a subdomain such as m.futureroofs.co.uk

The latter solutions is our preferred option and this week we have created the mobile version of the website of a flat roofing company in South Yorkshire, Future Roofs. There main website looks like this:

This now redirects to a mobile version of the site based upon screen size and or mobile device type to serve the website at m.futureroofs.co.uk.

A nice clean and simple version maintaining branding with a simple click to call action button.

We're also working on a much bigger mobile project which took up a lot of time last week, but is not yet in the public domain (and won't be for a few weeks), and this includes animation and will work in an app-like manner on all devices.

So what are you waiting for? Contact Tad Web Solutions for a great mobile website.

The Boro Feel Good Factor

Middlesbrough Football Club have certainly created a feel good factor across Teesside this week. A number of commentators suggest that the Olympic feel good factor is good for business in the UK and hopefully our very own Teesside version from Friday's football match v Sheff Wed will have the same effect. A big thank you needs to go to Steve Gibson and all at MFC for Friday night's great event.

Let me be clear, football is not my favourite sport, it comes below rugby union, cricket and rugby league in my list of sports to watch BUT in terms of the Tees Valley and it's profile as a region the ONLY sporting club known by many outside of the region is Middlesbrough Football Club. Therefore MFC is very important to all of us working and running businesses here.

Having said footy's not my favourite, I was brought up as a Boro fan. My Dad was big footy fan, played at a reasonable level and even played for the RAF in a 1-1 draw with an England team. He, like me, was Boro born and bred. He watched legends such as Mannion and Clough before I was born. He took me to my first match at Ayresome Park, a 2-2 draw against Sunderland in 1971 when I was 7 years old. Up to that point I was a fan of Dirty Leeds who were the top side in the country at a time when footy on TV was very limited. I was hooked (we were sat behind the goal in the East Stand and if he hadn't used his foot to block a Hickton shot that was destined for my face I might not have been).

Some great times followed, Jack Charlton's promotion team as a kid, as I got older and with most of my mates being footy fans there were great booze and footy trips away (Jamie Pollock's winner at Roker Park being a particular favourite), Juninho et al playing some sublime football, amazing Uefa Cup comebacks and more.

Once my son was old enough I switched from going with my mates and had a season ticket with my son, thus forcing him to change his very young allegiance from a TV Man Utd team to the Boro in the flesh and thus condemning him to a life of pessimism.

And then it all went wrong. I don't hate Gordon Strachan - I find him funny and the way he left Boro without compensation shows him to be a decent and honourable man - but I think he almost killed the club. It reached a point where I didn't even bother looking for the score on a weekend never mind not bothering with attending a match or even Ali's commentary on local radio.

Now that's changed. Mogga's in charge, local youngsters are playing and the players who aren't local have bought into what Teesside is about. Friend, Haroun and even the Mackem Leadbitter are all adopted Teessiders, one of us, following in the footsteps of adopted greats like Juninho and Mendi. It's a local club again and matters immensely.

Friday saw the club listen to the fans, the hard times we're having, and reduce prices for a match we could all watch on TV. There was a buzz on Teesside throughout the run up to the game, tickets started selling, people who haven't been for years came back, people brought their mates - it was like the Olympic buzz but for our own team and our own area. And what a performance, the team were fantastic, pride, passion, team spirit and skill - what a night.

Everyone is talking about it, local pride and belief in the club, the players and ourselves  and our region plus a great showing on TV to the nation. The start of something great on and off the pitch? I hope and believe so (though I won't be at the next home match as it's England v Springboks on TV, I did say rugby union is my favourite sport and it is England). I'm still a part-timer but I've now been to 5 home games this season which is the most for many years.

A massive thanks to Steve Gibson, the players and all at the club - I spent many years at Ayresome singing "We Shall Overcome" and I really think we will - as the club will play a big part, along with SSI re-opening the steelworks, in the rebirth of Teesside.

Not the Most Productive Week

Partly my fault and partly circumstances but last week wasn't the most productive with the best part of two days midweek taken out of my schedule with another cheeky day off, this time walking on the North Yorks Moors, and a doctor's visit including a bit of minor surgery (nowt worrying or too scary but takes time). The sneaky days of walking, which are in reality a delayed "summer" holiday, are now done until over Xmas when, weather permitting, I'll be out again.

So the week was mainly finishing off some work including a website news section and some artwork plus following a few sales leads and doing some networking. All of that was productive with some new work confirmed and artwork complete plus some new sales leads from the networking and new people met but not much done in the way of creating new websites.

The coming week will see some graphic design being completed, a mobile website done and taking part in the Start Up Britain Bus Tour as a "successful entrepreneur" to help advise young people who are thinking of setting up in business - never really thought of myself in those terms before but I suppose I am.

Monday will be mainly written off with a hospital appointment - doctors and hospital within a few days - sure sign I'm getting old (time for the knackers yard).

The Lakes at Last

Due to Jane starting a new job we didn't get a summer hol so I missed out out on an annual walking trip to the Lake District and had not been there since 2011 - and it is my favourite place on Earth. So when Jane suggested that on her day off on Thursday we should go to the Keswick, dump the car, bus up to Honister and walk back to Keswick there was only one thing to do! Schedule rearranged, up early and off we went. We arrived in glorious sunshine and, although it got colder and duller around lunchtiime, we had a great day of walking, there's even talk of a repeat event on Tuesday taking in Haystacks, weather permitting. Now Steve has joined us it makes this possible as the office is covered - day off midweek and catch up at the weekend.

The other highlight of the week was lunch with David Laud of i2i Business Solutions at Capaldis in Middlesbrough. Always great to meet up with David who played in big part in giving me the confidence to set up Tad Web Solutions and planning how we would grow. Capaldis is a great venue and there was a real free lunch (thanks David) and hopefully we will be able to work together on some ideas in the near future.

I did some "proper work" as well - including a new news blog for Henrietta Hire who provide classic wedding cars and chauffeurs in South Wales and some extra pages and SEO work for Aileen Coupe, a counsellor in Loughborough.

I also had a trip out with Matt for his MRI scan on his knee, all done with no fuss - unfortunately we still have no idea when he gets to see the consultant to find out the results. He'll be to old to play rugby again by the time we find out he's fit enough to play.

Lost Contracts and New Opportunities

Well last week we were informed we didn't get a key contract we pitched for which is a real disappointment as we were quite hopeful and looking forward to working with the company. I hope their chosen supplier does a great job for them and they've kindly provided some feedback which will help us with future pitches.

Still as one door closes others open and the experience is leading to a bit of a rethink on our marketing plans over the next year. We've had some business support from Jenny from Rainbow's End fully funded by Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council's Creative Industries project which has helped greatly in distilling out what we do really well, what distinguishes us from our competition, the messages we need to get out to potential clients and areas to focus on over the coming months.

This coming Tuesday sees David Laud of i2i Business Solutions kindly giving up his lunchtime for a business meeting with me. David has a lot to answer for as he is the person who I engaged to look at developing my part-time web design business into something better - leading me to set up a limited company in a recession and work longer hours and earn less than I did as an employee of others before! I love every minute of it and David's advice was excellent, hopefully he can help me take things further forward as we continue to grow our influence and staff.

On Friday I met up with Martin of World Insight Media of Saltburn. Whilst we have an overlap in the services we provide, we also have some separate skills that we could provide for each other as an enhanced service to our customers. Martin struck me as very likeable and ethical guy and we are exploring how we can help each other.

Last week saw us adding cookie compliance code for a client and adding an opening times management system to the website of The Pottery Loft, an arts & crafts centre and cafe in Billingham (and a great place to take the kids for a fun session).

We also completed our Small Business Solutions website - we are aiming to simplify working your way around our services and the Small Business Solutions site has a series of packaged options for purchase to provide the ideal solution for a new or micro business launching on the web, including e-commerce and e-marketing packages. We're also open to tweaking these to the needs of any new business so contact me if you don't see what you want - we're only too happy to help or pass you on to someone who can if we don't provide the service you require.

We also had another meeting to set up a business referrals network in Redcar and East Cleveland which was the biggest yet (even had to move to a bigger room) and had a couple of businesses keen to be involved more long term which is great - things are really moving forward with some great people and dynamic businesses. We also seem to have sorted out all the issues re funding a new apprentice and have interviews on Tuesday morning for a new Social Digital Apprentice via Middlesbrough College's partnership with the Digital Youth Academy.

The rest of the week saw a morning of sitting around in James Cook Uni Hospital for people to poke around with Matty's knee - we're not really any the wiser but at least he's walking around now and we're booked in for an MRI scan (or a sit in a hospital for hours) on Wednesday evening. My back and neck is still knackered so painkillers and no booze for over a week now :(

The Walking Wounded

With Matty having knackered knee ligaments and on crutches and me having something wrong with neck shoulder and arm (suspected trapped nerve), we're like a doctor's waiting room - so any GPs who are after a website for their practise should get in touch.

In between moaning like an old aching man, I had 5 visits to potential customers last week plus a couple of telephone enquiries to follow up. There hasn't been a single "no" yet but there are still 2 answers to come in and both of these are projects we'd very much like to be involved in. So fingers crossed for both of those and we may have the result by the end of next week. Still plenty of work in the pipeline to be cracking on with.

Last week saw a few website updates, a few Adwords accounts researched and set up, some SEO work, adding Google +1s for clients, a new microsite for Anglia Landscaping concentrating on Cambridge Landscaping, and a chunk of networking along with writing quotes.

We also had a meeting with Carl from Middlesbrough College to progress us employing a Social Digital Apprentice. Middlesbrough College is the only college in the area who provide this kind of apprentice in conjunction with the Digital Youth Academy. We've got a few issues with funding mainly due to a cock-up by Redcar Council's Routes to Employment people earlier in the year but there may be alternatives we are exploring this week. It will be a great opportunity for some young person as our plans are to make this post long term and also good to have a new person help drive us forward.

Next week involves the excitement of spending hours at the trauma clinic with Matt on Wednesday morning - better take some reading material.

Not the weekend I expected

Well today's plan was watching Matt play rugby for North Yorkshire v South Yorkshire in York but due to a ligament injury at training on Thursday he's hardly walking never mind smashing into people. Real pity and hope he's walking and playing again soon. So got out for a walk on The North Yorks Moors this morning instead.

The week has seen a lot of SEO analysis for a group of clients we manage with ideas for boosting visitors and conversions to sales. As part of this we have added some jquery animation and action buttons to a range of websites we have for Henrietta Hire, a wedding car company in South Wales.

The week has seen a couple of new clients come on board for new websites plus a good number of new sales leads including a very prestigious potential client we hope to be helping - we'll know more on that next week. Tuesday sees our new Web Developer, Steve, starting with us and we're glad to have him on board as things are getting busy.

We're also looking to start a Social Digital Apprentice, ideally from the Redcar & Cleveland area, and have a meeting with Middlesbrough College to explore this further. The role will involve e-marketing along with some face-to-face and telephone follow up calls. So if you are interested, or know someone who is, contact us via our website.

Last Wednesday we had a great networking meeting, with a lot of help from Russ Sawdon and Craig Moore of BNI, as we try to get a referrals networking group going in Redcar & East Cleveland. A few referrals are already passing round at this early stage and we had a few visitors along, some of whom seem interested in getting more involved.

The weeks "big event" was taking part in a photo shoot for Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council's press release for the Palace Hub, the new creative industries centre that we will be moving into when it opens in December. So look out for details in the local press with a photo of me along with Dee from Purple Tree Creative Productions (radio advertising) and some councillors - ever the self publicist!