Mobile First

For years, most Web teams have designed products and information for the desktop/laptop PC. For these teams, mobile (if it even happened) was a barebones port of the desktop version. Sadly, this approach actually made sense for a while. Browsing the Web on mobile phones was painful; carriers controlled access to the Web on their devices; and mobile network speeds often made everything grind to a halt. So few people used the Web on mobiles and those that did were frequently faced with an unpleasant experience. But things have changed so dramatically over the past few years that starting with the desktop may be an increasingly backwards way of thinking about a Web product. Designing for mobile first not only prepares you for the explosive growth and opportunities in this space, it forces you to focus and enables you to innovate.