It is a cliché, but like all clichés, there is a grain of truth to the saying “We live in an increasingly mobile society”. I know it is true for me. I seldom use a landline telephone any more, my email comes over my iPhone and my children never write me letters – it’s always a text or an email, sent from a coffee shop or the back seat of a car. Even my dictionary is contained in an app on my iPhone. Yet when it comes to investor relations web sites, many companies expect shareholders to be seated in front of a desktop computer with a broadband connection. Yes, I can get to corporate investor sites on my phone, but waiting for an image rich page to download on my mobile is like watching paint dry – and I’m much more patient than my twenty-something children.
This is all by way of saying that more companies should pay attention to methods for delivering their message to mobile devices quickly and easily. I have seen more of this type of accessibility on web sites of European companies than for American companies. I’m not quite sure why this should be other than a general observation that Europeans seem to have been quicker to adapt many types of mobile phone technologies.
The insurance company Aviva does a good job of this. As you can see from the screen shot of their Stay in Touch page, you can access news feeds and email updates. Further, they make available a mobile site, which is devoid of graphics and therefore loads quickly. And they put all of this on a single page. It is a very efficient design that quickly allows shareholders to decide how they wish to receive information when not seated at their desk.
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Lucy is Editor at Corporate Eye
