One scene of my return trip from Venezuela that will always stick in my mind is a four-year-old sitting on the floor in the Atlanta airport using an iPad. I was in middle school while the internet was becoming accessible and the cell phone was first entering popular society.

I make jokes about being part of the last age group to grow up with dial-up internet, sharing a cell phone with my younger sister in high school, and about the soon-to-be antiquated technologies I can relay to wide-eyed grandchildren (Grandpa, tell us the story about the tape player!), but nothing more than that image at the airport tells me society today is totally technological.

So what does this mean?

Our phones are bigger than our hands (our heads, depending on the age), utilize touch screens, and can access the internet from anywhere. Desktop computers are only used for work or gaming, as casual users are switching to the ease and visual appeal of a tablet. Now, more than ever, the importance of having an online presence is real. The general age of people with access to the internet has gone down, creating a need for businesses to have a more "hip" representation: mobile-accessible websites.

There aren't many guarantees in the business world, but one I can think of is this: if someone is browsing your website with a smartphone and cannot read anything on the site or click any of the links due to the website being unoptimized for mobile viewing, that someone is not going to stay on your website for very long. Online banking, online shopping, social media... most everything can be done online in present-day America and most people have smart phones or tablets that allow for almost constant involvement with the Internet and its content (if desired).

Starting to see the importance?

The increased ability of technology has done wonderful things for our efficiency as a nation, but it has also brought with it an expectancy of things being immediately accessible. So why not bring your website up to date? Eliminate a potential reason for customers to skip over your website, or worse—lose a current customer because they have become frustrated with your online content and its ease of use (it happens!). Optimizing your website to accommodate for mobile web users involves small adjustments that can be easily programmed by a mobile website development company.

So with the value of developing your website for mobile devices apparent, what's the next step? Contacting a mobile web development company? Creating a downloadable or purchasable application specific to your company? Maybe something to be addressed in our next blog...

Let us know some horror stories of yours regarding frustrating website experiences (preferably while on a mobile device, but a desktop website will do as well!) and the resulting fallout.