At yesterday's Social Media World Forum, Dominic Burch - Head of Communications and Social Media for ASDA - said “Stop thinking about websites - they’re dead – just think about the content and getting that right for mobile.
As reported on The Drum, he went on to say “For us everything is mobile-first from a content perspective. If it doesn’t work on mobile – go home. If the video doesn’t load, the content doesn’t look right or the photos are too big -if I can’t see it on my mobile devices it’s a waste of time.” Does he have a point? Are websites really pushing up the daisies?
Well, it's important to note that Dominic was talking to an audience who had specifically attended to hear about social media, so to a certain extent, he would say that. On the other hand, he's the big cheese on such matters, for one of the UK's largest retailers, so we can assume this is something he believes. For me, that's a problem, because he's almost certainly wrong.
For the purposes of this debate, it's safe to say Mr. Burch is defining a website as a page or pages of information, displayed on a desktop or laptop browser using HTML, PHP or similar code. (Although, it could certainly be argued that any data transmitted to a user, via the World Wide Web to any device is, by its nature, 'a website').
Burch is proposing internet use has now entirely migrated to mobile devices - including tablets, presumably - therefore the creative communications industry should, henceforth, concentrate on content for those machines and forget the traditional 'home computer' browser. I don't doubt this is the eventual destination for digital formats (and I'd include TV and radio here), but I also firmly believe we haven't yet arrived. If I was being generous to Dominic, I'd say he is spectacularly premature.
Just taking a straw poll of friends, family and acquaintances, only about a quarter of them own a smart phone and far fewer have a tablet. Most of the people I know continue to use websites on their computer. Admittedly there has been a clear migration to laptops or netbooks, and the younger the person, the more likely they are to be 'mobile'. However, the 'traditional' website is still the preferred interface. In fact, I'd go further and say websites continue to offer the most useful and satisfying experience for users.
As I mentioned, Burch was addressing a conference on social media and these platforms do come into their own on mobile kit. There may be complex reasons for this, but essentially I think the simplicity of social services, and the fact people have more to say when they're out of the house, make Facebook, Twitter and YouTube so effective in this setting. Nevertheless, try booking a holiday, using Skype or completing a lengthy form on a smart phone and the benefits of a large screen and expansive-format site rapidly become apparent. If you have a smart phone that is.
Interestingly, when this story came to my attention, I ran a Google search for the Social Media World Forum. As you'd expect, there were Twitter feeds and Facebook pages associated with the event - but the result with the most prominence and the link which gave me the most information, in the most accessible and persuasive form, was the traditional, full-width, full-graphic website. When he was invited to speak, I wonder whether Dominic Burch did the same.
Magnus Shaw is a blogger, copywriter and consultant
Lee March 20th, 2013, in the afternoon
This is an interesting topic here and I have to say, no way are websites dead! Thats a silly swooping statement in my eyes, I think its more about designing content to work in the correct formats and screen sizes. I think your aiding his point a little here when you talk about using a mobile or tablet to book travel tickets, your being forced to a full screen because of the poor user interface for the smaller screened device, if the website was calibrated to work on a smaller screen would not more people use the mobile version? I believe they would because its a device thats readily to hand, but this is still via a website and it would have to be for simplicity and ease in getting hold of the data. Users will not want to waste time searching for a specific app, downloading it, then performing the function the require; Its all for to time consuming! Then there is the matter of designing all these different apps to perform the same function solely for an individual device, of which their would then have to be teams of people designing apps for all the different manufactures and devices out there, it becomes far to uneconomical against a well designed site with easy access designed once but calibrated to work on a multitude of screen sizes. Websites are far from dead!