Desktop connections are less reliable, more vulnerable to cyber attacks, and slower than most mobile connections. As such, more and more individuals are utilizing the convenience of mobile connections for most of their Internet needs. It’s imperative to have high quality, consistent, fast, and reliable web hosting to accommodate mobile searchers. Will a mobile site help your law firm?

For most consumers, mobile Internet use has become part of daily life. If a business doesn’t take advantage of the Internet, then it’s losing many of its potential customers. At the same time, if a consumer isn’t satisfied with their experience once they get to the mobile site, then they move on to a more engaging competitor’s site.

Mobile Internet Continues To Dominate Search

Recent statistics show that:

  • In 2013, over 90% of Americans owned a smartphone.
  • In 2014, a combined 60% of internet searches took place by tablet or smartphone.
  • In 2015, over seven percent of smartphone owners had no immediate access to the internet other than their smartphone.
  • Worldwide, mobile page views on smartphones alone accounted for almost 50% of all searches 2015.
  • Data from 2015 found that Americans collectively check their smartphones over eight billion times per day, which is around 44 times per person each day.
  • Between 60%-80% of Americans research travel reservations, food, health, lifestyle, banking, and other information sources through a mobile connection.

The implication is clear. There is a huge difference between desktop rankings and smartphone rankings. Low to mid-level web hosting was sufficient a decade ago. Today, if a law firm is not able to reach its audience through mobile search or display, then it is losing out to competitors who are providing it. Providing users with a satisfactory mobile experience not only encourages them to use the offered services, but also recommend it to a friend.

First Impressions Are Make Or Break Moments

Eye tracking software research from several entities like Google and Missouri University of Science and Tech all concur that it takes a web user two-tenths of one second to formulate a first impression. It takes less than three seconds for a user’s eyes to land on the most influential element of the page design. Users don’t focus on any single area for longer than seven seconds. Here are some tips on how to make a great mobile site.

Part of these invaluable seconds can be eaten away by connectivity issues. Research shows that conversion rates go down by up to seven percent for each second of page response delay.

Quality Web Hosting

Having a quality web host is of the utmost importance when it comes to the quality of the site for both searchers and search engines.

Search engines rely on being able to quickly and consistently crawl a website to index it for related searches. Always consider the consistency of a connection, update frequency, and other downtime timing when selecting a web host. Also, assess that a web host isn’t making sacrifices to service performance to accomplish being consumer friendly.

Minimums For Quality Web Hosting

Aside from monitoring, site backups, CDN, and an SSL certificate, here are four qualities any web service should have to properly host a law firm’s website:

  •    Site Caching

For re-access, the web host should properly compress and cache files to improve performance and create a memory that will lessen the load of the webpage.

  •    Server Downtime

How often is web hosting failing or being inaccessible due to prolonged, frequent downtimes? A website not up and running can’t be utilized by searchers, meaning they don’t wait… they move on to a competitor’s website that is up and running. The web host should offer minimal server downtime.

  •    Connection Time

Quick and Consistent. The first-byte time (TTFB) which is the server’s response time to the browser’s requests, should be less than 350 milliseconds.

  •    Support

Phone, online chat, email – the web hosting company should be accessible to the legal website’s operation team. The team at the hosting service should be knowledgeable enough to provide appropriate support.

Web hosting is becoming one of the most important aspects of marketing your law firm. In this day and age when everyone has a smartphone and browses the web on mobile, it is important to make sure you reach that audience. Quality web hosting will surely provide you with many potential clients. Contact us today if you are looking to optimize your mobile site or need help getting started.