Almost everyone from 7 to 70 has a mobile device clutched in their little sticky fingers. Initially these devices were used for calls only but quickly developed into text and photos and now we cannot really call them phones any more. These devices are more about being in touch no matter where you are, by phone, text, photo, video, email and soon to be TV.

With the Silver Surfers getting younger and younger each year, we see more of them coming online and making full use of the latest technology to stay in touch with family and even check their investments online. The tech savvy 20 to 30 somethings are making full use of every new bit of technology available both on PC and mobile devices and they have a profile on almost every social network from FaceBook to Flickr and YouTube (just to name a few). They are also very active on Mxit and Twitter, have blogs and can be seen on most blog aggregators. Last and definitely not the least are the tweenies, the largest growing group, just as active as the previous group but not wanting to be tied to a PC, they are on the go, anywhere, anytime, always looking to be entertained in bite size chunks on their mobile devices.  This is the group that goes into a shop, tries on a hat, takes a picture on their mobile, uploads it to a site like Zoopy and asks their friends if they should buy it. They really know what they want and how to utilize their device to the fullest.

As we move into 2008, the mobile internet is going to be the fastest growing area of the internet with mobile usage on the rise, so we have to ask ourselves the question, “Am I ready for the change and is my site mobile friendly”. If the answer is “no” (or “I don’t know”) then these are a few of the things you need to consider:

Let’s start right at the beginning with your intellectual property: do you own your .mobi domain?  A lot of site owners split their site between an HTML and WAP versions. I took a look at some random South African sites to see if they complied and found that the following sites do in fact own their .mobi domains:

MTN
Amatomu
Afrigator
Yeigo
Muti
Zoopy

Sites with their .mobi domains owned by others:

SARugby
CellC
SouthAfrica
Keo
IOL
RSA

Is your .mobi domain registered? Perhaps you should check it out - you are going to need it for SEO, marketing and of course to strengthen your brand.

Lastly, is your site mobi friendly? Check it out here http://ready.mobi

This is a free evaluation. The ready.mobi testing tool evaluates mobile-readiness using industry best practices & standards. They provide you with a free report that allocates a score (from 1 to 5) and in-depth analysis to determine how well your site displays on a mobile device. Give it a few minutes to check through your site before it displays the results. 

I was quite surprised at the local results. Taken over a random test of South African sites, these were the best:

1. MTN with a score of 4 (Good)
2. Skyrove with a score of 3 (Fair)

Of the rest that I tested, the scores were 1 or 2 (both being bad). The site does however give a long list of what needs to be done to upgrade the site to mobile friendliness.

Perhaps this will be one of my New Year’s resolutions: to ensure that my site is as mobile friendly as it can possibly be. Looking at the future, it’s worth it.