Why it may be time to rethink your old website.

The use of mobile devices to access the Internet is becoming the medium of choice, with more than two-thirds (69 percent) of all Internet users surveyed doing so daily, according to Mobile Web Watch 2012, a study of consumers in Europe, Latin America and South Africa conducted by Accenture (NYSE: ACN). In addition, consumers are using multiple devices to connect to the web, including smartphones (61 percent), netbooks (37 percent), and tablets (22 percent).

With statistics like this it’s time think about your demographic and the design of your site to be responsive (adapts automatically to the size of the screen/device it is being viewed on) if it is not already. Google now officially penalizes sites which are not responsive.

While we are on the topic of things google prefers (They are getting to be a bit like big brother, perhaps a bit too influential) is your site secure? Does it say http:// or https:// in the URL field in the browser? Most browsers show a lock icon if the site is secure (https://). You may be thinking my site doesn’t involve any ecommerce so why should it need to be secure? Well, because google more or less is going to require it as we move forward. The browsers are starting already to display a ‘This website is not secure’ warning in the field up top where the URL is displayed.

There’s an insightful article about this issue by Kayne Basques here.