How to Create Mobile-friendly Reading Experience for Your Audience

Only a responsive design is not enough to ensure the best mobile-friendly user experience. A responsive website is truly responsive only if not just its design but also the content is optimized for mobile devices. If a site adapts to the screen size of a mobile device but the content goes out of proportions, it will not appeal to the mobile readers who consume digital content many times more than desktop or laptop users. To say precisely, a responsive site needs mobile-friendly content that reads great on mobile devices. Here is a guide on how to create mobile-friendly content:

White Space is the soul of convenient reading

If brevity is the soul of wit, white space is the soul of convenient reading. Some amount of white space in the right balance with content makes a page not only look fresh but also read conveniently. It is much useful for mobile device users or mobile readers. Judicious use of white space motivates mobile device users for reading by chunking the data and highlighting important areas of the content itself. It is one of the mobile-friendly content formatting trends in major cities like New York, Austin and San Francisco where a majority of mobile readers resides. Use white space before and after a quote, a subhead and a bulleted or numbered list to highlight the content.

Replace wordy phrases with one-word substitutes

Simplicity is the mainstay of mobile-friendly content. It can be achieved and ensured by replacing wordy phrases with simple, short synonyms in the content for mobile device users. Wordy phrases like ‘due to the fact’, ‘at this point of time,’ ‘in the near future,’ ‘in accordance with,’ etc. make sentences too long to read and understand easily. Replace such wordy phrases with one-word substitutes like because, now, shortly and accordingly to make sure mobile-friendly reading experience. That’s why writing mobile-friendly content is an art which only wordsmiths can perform.

Give a second thought to Long, Descriptive Headlines

Writing long, descriptive headlines is a trend these days. Many writers and bloggers have taken fancy to this trendy style of headline writing. Some marketing experts opine that descriptive headlines pack in more emotive appeal than short, crispy headlines of 5 or 6 words. Some others claim that short headlines with up to 6 words score the highest click-through rate. Besides, short headlines are easy to read on mobile devices. Writing short, punchy and descriptive headlines is no layman’s job. It is a professional practice.

The content structure should be Snack-able for Coffee

The content structure should be aligned with an average screen size of mobile devices. It is an important consideration for the mobile-friendly reading experience. The more optimized the content structure is, the better it reads. Chunking is the key to mobile-friendly content structure. Experts say that mobile content should be snack-able so that mobile device users can read and grasp it during a short break for coffee. Content without subheads or highlighted quotes or bulleted lists look flat, which often repels mobile readers. Only professional wordsmiths who are familiar with what makes a great mobile-friendly reading experience can make highly snack-able content for a mobile device using coffee lovers.