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The advent of smartphones like the iPhone, Storm, Pre and Nokia N97 with full HTML  web browsers make this question even trickier to answer.   After all, with the ability to view full HTML pages and zoom into specific sections, as needed, you should be able to simplify your development needs.  However, in my daily mobile web usage (via my iPhone) I’ve observed that a well designed mobile site is still much easier to navigate than sites with full HTML site pages on a mobile device….even the almighty iPhone.  This is an initial consideration.

Some additional factors to consider in making this decision are:

Mobile Internet usage adoption – US consumers accessing the mobile web is a fairly common event these days.   Some have estimated that in the US, Mobile Internet Usage Is At Least One-Third And Maybe One-Half Of Wired Internet Usage.  Also one should consider the smartphone market growth that will be driven by fierce competition (and reasonable pricing) amongst the main players identified  above.

Business goals, products and services - Answers of YES to two or more of these questions could qualify your site as a candidate for developing a mobile site:

• Are you a digital or mobile agency selling mobile strategy & production? (actually, if the answer to this is yes, read no more…you need a mobile site)
• Does your site provide the type of information that consumers might need or want to access on the go?
• Do you sell advertising space on your site and are you seeking additional ad revenue opportunities?
• Do you publish news and information related to the mobile industry?
• Have you exhausted all quickly scalable traffic and revenue generating channels/opportunities for your general site?

If you want some further reading on mobile sites,  mobile agency Crisp Wireless has a recent blog post that outlines numerous advantages of creating mobile sites versus creating device specific applications.  I hope this little riff was helpful in making heads or tails of a common, and complicated question.  Please let me know your thoughts, comments and questions!

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