Actinic desktop for mobiles?

[feemish]

I've just received the actinic promo of actinic online for mobile devices...

I'm wondering how actinic desktop performs on various mobile devices ?
Is there anything that can be done to make it perform better?

Are there any plans for actinic desktop to have a mobile devices overhaul in future versions... or are we desktop users being left behind?

[TraceyHand]

By "how actinic desktop performs" I presume you mean how sites designed by Actinic (Desktop) perform?

I guess it's something a designer would need to check. Checking how a site looks and works on a mobile browser is as important as cross-browser checking nowadays, IMO

[Duncan Rounding]

I think the checkout is the biggest issue. I remember Jonty trying to convert it to css some time back.

[feemish]

By "how actinic desktop performs" I presume you mean how sites designed by Actinic (Desktop) perform?

Yes..

The Actinic emailout said 'Is your store mobile optimised?'
It then goes on to say that if you have actinic online then customers
'Automatically see a mobile optimised version of your store'

Actinic desktop doesnt automatically serve a mobile optimised store to mobile customers does it? So we are at some disadvantage here..

I must admit, I dont have a smart phone, Ipad or whatever, so I dont really know what differences there are.. but there must be some.. that make stores run better on mobile devices... otherwise why does the advert ask if your store is mobile optimised?

Just a bit concerned as to why actinic desktop isnt automatically mobile optimised if actinic online is?

[Duncan Rounding]

Actinic Online is a completley different product. You don't have full design freedom with the online version but you do have an online database that you can serve data from in different ways.

Mobile optimisation is a bit of buzz word at the moment. Many smart phones have decent browsers that will easily allow the users to see and view any website regardless of them being specially 'optimised'.

The optimisation only really simplifies the content presentation that some users prefer. In time I think portable device users will want the rich content that a standard website can offer, browsers will evolve too making the interaction easier and better with less need for 'optimisation'.

That said I think there is market demand for mobile styled sites and quite a lot should be able to be done within Actinic Desktop to get close to that.

[Darren B]

I looked into this a while back and having been over loads of websites offering mobile optimised versions i actually found many of these harder to use.

The menu system did not work aswell or did not contain as many levels, the product info was short or missing vital infomation and i had real problems trying to view the normal site.

I have actually now decided to shelve the idea as i honestly believe this will all become less important. my iphone browses many site perfectly well, if i cant see something i just zoom in a little bit.

So optimised for smart phones is probably important for some markets but will not be best for all IMHO

Darren

[feemish]

ok guys thanks for the replies.

Maybe I fell for the actinic online marketing email myself then..
made me think I was missing out on something being on actinic desktop..

I do have sales coming in from people using mobiles.. people have told me they ordered on their phones..and I have seen my site on a mobile.. its true what you say.. you can just zoom in for detail..

cheers

[Duncan Rounding]

The Android browser will actually reformat the page automatically to suit your mobile display if you simply tap in the text.

[Natalie]

Just to summarise, the Actinic Online mobile store feature is optimised and can also be viewed un-optimised from any mobile device.

However, it makes sense to offer the easiest and most user friendly option to your customers. Having to zoom in and out isn't ideal so mobile commerce is definitely something all Online sites should consider.

Something else to take into account is the checkout process which is also included as part of the mobile store feature in Actinic Online.

[feemish]

It might be helpful for those using paypal to know that if you add Paypal Express payments to your checkout that this method of checking out IS optimised for mobiles.