Bluetrain Mobile | Mobile Marketing Engine | Mobile CMS

In Transit Blog


How to Build a Mobile Website, Part 6: Hybrid Mobile Website

by Steffan Berelowitz

10
Jan
2012

Hybrid Mobile Website

In Brief

A hybrid mobile website is the best way to build a website for marketers trying to reach the mobile audience because it combines the strengths of several design patterns (custom coded, mobile stylesheets, responsive design) while eliminating their weaknesses. Hybrid mobile websites provide you with complete creative freedom to design a mobile website that is uniquely tailored to your brand. They enable you to create pages that are custom tailored for the mobile audience with short, succinct content, and images that have been specifically selected and optimized for a mobile display. Content that is frequently updated on your website can also be automatically displayed on your mobile website without the disadvantages of transcoding.

Definition

A hybrid mobile website enables you to determine which pages from your website you would like to custom tailored for the mobile audience and which pages should automatically be updated from your desktop website. The content that automatically updates from your website will be displayed using a feed via RSS, XML, or other common feed formats. The content that is custom tailored can be entered using a content editor (WYSIWYG mobile CMS). Your graphic designer has nearly complete freedom to use imagery, video, fonts, and messaging that is completely unique to your brand. A hybrid mobile website combines two powerful marketing features: a completely custom look and feel with a robust content management system that’s very easy to use and maintain.

After a brief one-time configuration of dynamic content, this kind of website does not require any technical skills to maintain. Once the configuration is in place, all changes, updates, and modifications can be completed by someone in a marketing department. The navigation for a hybrid mobile website can be customized specifically for someone who is on a smartphone, enabling you to list only those links that are most important for the mobile user. Location-based links (directions, maps) and touch-to-call phone numbers can easily be prioritized. This kind of website also uses an advanced navigation control that enables people to quickly and easily link directly to the content they are looking for, regardless of whether the mobile website is 15 pages or 150 pages.

Features

  • Easy to use
  • Enables you to quickly and easily create mobile content
  • Completely customized information architecture and navigation
  • Will work seemlessly with your regular desktop website to accept content feeds via XML, RSS or a CMS plugin
  • Feed frequently updated content directly into the mobile website and have it automatically update
  • Produces beautiful, functional, effective websites

Evaluation

Hybrid mobile websites are the best choice for midsized or larger organizations and professional marketers. We think this is the best approach, that’s why Bluetrain Mobile is a hybrid mobile website platform.

Who should use it?

Marketers at mid-size or large businesses.

Example

White Paper Is Available Now

Want the whole series in one easy-to-ready format? Download a PDF of the full white paper “How to Build a Mobile Website”!

DOWNLOAD THE WHITE PAPER

download-whitepaper

Bluetrain Mobile

Everything Mobile. Anything Possible.