How to Create a Mobile site through Google GoMo

Google’s GOMO is a short simple service to generate a mobile site instantly from your existing interface. I had carried a test on the same via demo BlogSpot. That is the easiest way to explain you about all the features. GoMo is Google’s free service for those who are looking for a simple mobile site without going in the process of development. You just need to provide your URL and that’s all GoMo generates a site sample for you based on pre-configure website. It has worked on many websites. The importance of mobile site is rising as Smartphone started getting into existence. Web is cheaper and new technology had made many sites more compatible for all platforms. It is necessary that with your full site you must carry a mobile version also. This becomes easier for your users to access your website and stay updated. The following article is based on entire guide how you can build a mobile site with the help of GoMo. For the 1st year there is no charge on it. Or else there is a value pack for $108. Yet there is no need to pay for any service. You can sign up with your existing Gmail id and start working on your website. Rightnow there is unlimited email and phone support provided by GoMo in case you face any difficultly. Other than this GoMo also offers you to choose a developer. There are some references on the official website (howtogomo.com) under GET STARTED > Find a Developer. If you are not sure about going with automated process you can hire a developer based on your budget. GoMo has made our task more easily eliminating the time needed to create a mobile site. That involves finding a developer, then making a template of your site, then setting up different database, etc. GoMo brings a full pack of features where you need to simply click on the interface to generate mobile version of your website. Before generating it offers you a preview so that you can choose and go ahead as per your need.

If we talk about ecommerce, technical forums, or news website, then all of them need a mobile version. For a user to open the current website on a small screen is annoying. A mobile site is a more optimized version with better text, content, and links. The user can simply click on the most needed stuff and access information. The same is applicable for ecommerce also. No one loves to open a big page and then search for links. Only some Smartphone’s comes with inbuilt engine which enhances the web surfing. But that too is very limited. With my demo blog I created some post to ensure how this thing works. I am not going to give you a vast example, but quick settings by which you can create a site instantly. There is no need to worry about your web server. There are no changes done on that. GoMo works on its own server creating a replica of your website in mobile form. You also do not need to enter your web server logins. This is the best positive point I found yet. Ecommerce and mobile platforms go hand in hand. On a desktop version more products are displayed while mobile site can be used to display the hottest offers. You are getting a free mobile site instantly. Thanks Google for such rich features.

GoMo and Adsense:

Many of you might be wondering what will happen to ads. Is it possible to get ads on mobile version. How to promote my new mobile? What about Adwords. The answer is simple. Everything will work. Google has done great implementation for that. Your mobile site is just like regular one. There are no changes and your existing services will also work on the mobile version. You can use Adwords. The mobile site can be promoted with the help of Adwords campaign. Because creating site is not the last work. After that the most important step is promoting your website, so that your people should came to know. Appropriate promotion will help people to locate your site more easily. It is possible to create mobile only ad campaigns. You will need to visits Google blogs for that to read in detail how this works. With Mobile-only ad campaign your site will get more visibility. Another option is promoting your site with Mobile Ads. A separate format for mobile is used by Google to display ads.

Without getting in coding stuff, Google offers simple interface to configure that. You can promote that product by buying mobile ads. You can configure ad and choose a preview to see how it will appear. Later on you can publish the same. Keyboard targeting is also added. For detailed information on this I will recommend you to once visit Google Mobiles Ads blog. There are ample of information to monetize your size. Google+ pages are integrated for a powerful social networking support and Adsense support. Earn revenues same as you earn from standard site. In short your area of earning expands more when you go for a mobile version. You can target a larger audience by promoting your site on portable platform.

Create a Mobile site through GoMo

GoMo gives you a free 1 year premium hosting service. After that charges are applied. 1 year is quiet enough to expand your business. If you had started new website, you can make a mobile version of the same also, and if you find that in future this is not going to give you a much help, you can discontinue the same. Google helps its users by giving email and phone support to deal with various errors. Many free services like this lacks technical support. The process to build up a mobile site is easy. GoMo arranges ample of elements properly. It not only reduces stuff which is not needed but a make a prefect preview of your current site. It does not looks complicated nor dull, but a simple phone site. Sharing information becomes more easier. Let’s begin with the process of creating website.

Step 1 :

Go on - howtogomo.com > Test your Site > GoMoMeter.

The step involves in process to check how your website will look. You can find out the performance before making a mobile version. This is important step to make a site. Click on TEST YOUR SITE after entering the full site URL in Enter your Website’s URL box. After a few time you can see a mobile version with option to choose the right category for your site. It is recommended that you must choose the right category here. Following is a glimpse of all categories :

• Publisher : This section deals for CMS companies. Those who earn revenue from their websites by publishing new content. Also the category includes business which sell content, or simply carry out survey, etc. If you are engaged in online content based business then choose this option.
• Online Only : This section is for those who carry online shop or ecommerce site. If you are engaged in online buying selling, gaming, advertising, etc choose this one.
• Lead Generation : This section is for those who are in business of helping their clients directly. For example insurance, hotels, etc. The business which involved in direct client buying and selling comes under this category.
• Brand Driven : All branded products come under this category. If you sell some brand or engaged with business with specific brand only, then choose this option.
• Multi-Channel – Business which is carried out on both mode, online and offline comes under this section. Mostly financial companies come under this category along with telecom.

Once you had done with choosing the right section for your site you have to fill up small details below. These details will help GoMo to make your mobile website better. This details are like simple question based on broken image or missing content, text quality and scroll, links visibility, shopping cart visibility, etc. Provide appropriate answers for the same so that you can get a better output. Once you filled up all stuff clicks on GET RESULTS. The next process is getting a site report. GoMo works on automated engine that calculates your site rating. It generates a report which can help to optimize your mobile site in better way. Rating is given from 6 points. They are Loading Time, Images, Text, Navigation, Conversion and Accessibility. The result page gives you following information :

• Rating : Out 6 your website will be rated by GoMo. Higher rating means better site. GoMo generates the mobile site on the basis of its structure and design.
• Loading Time : The loading is important. GoMo test the site loading time and if exceeds 5 seconds then it is not good for your website.
  http://img849.imageshack.us/img849/866/002ktq.jpg
• Images : GoMo checks that all images are well loaded. You can see a small red cross mark. This means that the part needs to be optimized more.
• Text : GoMo Check and gives you information on text visibility. If the text is too small or cannot be seen without zooming then you can see a visible small cross icon. http://img841.imageshack.us/img841/6418/003eer.jpg
• Navigation : GoMo checks your site navigation links. It is another important thing. Because a site with poor navigation can annoy users.
• Conversion : Conversion find out details related to your site shopping cart.
• Accessibility : Here GoMo checks that the accessibility options like Search box is easily viewable or not.

Once you check your Test Result click on VIEW FULL REPORT. GoMo will provide you a pdf file with all information added to optimize your site best for mobile platform. There is additional stuff in a pdf file which will be very helpful for you in future. Once you are done with that click on BUILD YOUR SITE.

Step 2 :

This second step where you will start making your website. Scroll down if you are not able to locate URL box. Type of your website URL in that and then click on MAKE MY SITE MOBILE. That’s all. Look below for further detailed option.

After click on MAKE MY SITE MOBILE a new window will appear which has ample of options to customize the new mobile site. There are 4 process involved here to make the final site live. They are

• SELECT THEME – Add a site theme, customize color, etc.
• EDIT SITE
• SAVE SITE
• GO LIVE

Each of the above process has option to make your site better.

A). SELECT THEME :

As the demo site that I tested is a Blog, so I will go with blog templates. But you can still switch that and use a website template depending on your need. The Choose Theme Window is divided into 2 parts. First one is the default templates that you can select and the second is a mobile preview version. The Mobile Preview screen to the right gives you the same output that you can see on a phone. You can click links, visit pages, etc though it. It will give you a clean view of navigation links, etc. Here you can simply test the website thoroughly before publishing it. The themes are divided in two forms. List View and Thumbnail View. The list view gives you a short icon of any image in article with Title on the right side while thumbnail view will show you clickable icons of article.

Choose the best layout you like and then click on Next Button.

B). EDIT SITE

This section has 4 different options to modify your site. They are :

• Edit Header & Logo
• Edit Blog Home Page
• Edit Blog Post
• Edit Comments

Each of this option provides you detailed way to customize your website. There is a small menu which gives you a Basic Look and Full View. Click on full you can find certain drag and drop options for your mobile site. There is difference between Basic option and Full. In Full you can see Footer and Add Home Icon as additional settings. Also the below bar consist of some widgets that you can add to your website. This widget helps you to make your website more interactive without doing any major changes to current design. For example : Contact Form.

Let’s go with each option on detail:

i). Header & Logo :

This part consists of adding a Logo of your site and a Head Title. The log will appear before Title. A preview screen will help you to see changes as you keep modifying the same. It has made in more detail so that users can get everything on single screen. This section has three different settings for entire site editing. Check the below list for complete options details.

When you click on Add Logo the next screen that you see is to choose an image. GoMo offers you 3 different ways to add a logo file. You can choose an image form site, upload from your computer or simply put a URL. This section offers you a complete menu to Edit images, Change Image, Link to Logo (website url, email, new page, call, send sms), add color and shape to logo and play with css or html code if you want under more settings. It is very detailed and has all stuff that you need. Have a look on the settings below one by one to get a clear idea about the logo section.

• Header > Logo > Edit : Resize / Alignment / Crop
• Header > Logo > Change Image : From Site / Uploaded / By URL
• Header > Logo > Link : Add a website url to the logo / Add a new page of your site / Add a email address / Enter Phone number for calling & Enter phone number of SMS.
• Header > Logo > Design : Add Border Color & change logo shape
• Header > Logo > More : Add appropriate spacing / CSS Code / HTML Code

ii). Blog Home Page

Blog Homepage helps you to customize the way the site will be seen on phone. You can add an interactive background, title and modify the body text. There are ample of options here which will help you to make the site visible more clearly. With the help of Result generated by GoMo you can make necessary changes. Have a look on the settings.

• Block Home Page > Background > Blog Post Review : Change current background / Choose Color palette or Add Image
• Block Home Page > Background > Home Page : Change current background / Choose Color palette or Add Image
• Block Home Page > Titles > Color : Change Current Text Color / Choose color from default color palette and Choose color from default standard color palette.
• Block Home Page > Titles > Text Size : Simple bar to adjust your content text size
• Block Home Page > Titles > Font Family: Choose the font family from Arial, Arial Black, Arial Narrow, Book Antiqua, Comic Sans MS, Courier New, Georgia, Helvetica, Impact, Palatino, Sans-serif, Tahoma, Times New Roman, Trebuchet MS and Verdana.
• Block Home Page > Body Text > Same option that you will find under Titles sections.

iii). Blog Post

Blog Post helps you to modify the content page. This is the article page of your site. You can modify the same as per your choice. The option provided under this is very much similar to above. Only there is added category for Links which will help you to modify the links displayed on the article page. You can change the color, text and font.

iv). Blog Comments :

This section is similar to Post. You can make changes to font, text and color of comments text. You can customize the same as per your need or you can simply make it different so that the content is visible separately. Anyhow most of the changes are taken by default. But you can do such changes to make your blog more attractive. Here under comments you can add special formatting so that they are visible separately.

v). Footer

With options under footer you can create a separate look for it. The options provided here are almost similar. But you can shape your footer as per your need. The more buttons helps you to make changes via html and css.

vi). Add Home Icon :

This section is quiet unique. Here you can play with your site icons. You can modify them to meet the theme of your website. Just have a look on the below image. The home icon allows you to add your favorite icons based on post you are making. You can simply put no icon to use the default one. There are three sections here. They are Home Screen Icon, Startup Image and Reminder. Home Screen Icons allows you to add an app like icon. This icon can be placed on the phone home screen. When they tap on the same they visit your site instantly. On the same you can configure the startup image. When a user tap on the icon created by you on his phone, which image you want to display depends on you. The second option gives you to add a startup image and the last one Reminder help you to add a popup message to your site. When a user visits your site on his phone, he can see the popup message to add this icon on its home screen.

Home Screen Icon :

Startup Image :

Gomo Startup Image

Reminder :

Gomo Reminder

ADD CONTENT

This is the last option on second step. You can add some interactive widgets to your site. You just need to drag the same to preview screen towards right and the widget will make its own place. You can adjust it location. You can add widget on any page you want. When you are adding any widget like Photo Gallery, you will have to provide appropriate images access to that the content can be displayed. Once you drag the widget a screen appears to add images of your choice. Following is list of widgets that you can add.

• Click to Call -- Add a call button on your website screen
• Mobile Maps -- Adds a mobile map feature
• Google AdSense – Adds Google Ads
• Image – Adds a Image Preview box on the site
• Image Slider – Adds a multiple image slider
• Photo Gallery – Adds a Photo Gallery
• Contact From – Adds a contact from
• Open Table – Adds a restaurant table availability widget
• Restaurant Menu – Adds a restaurant menu on the site
• PayPal – Adds a PayPal payment option on site.
• Checkout – Adds a checkout box.
• 2 Columns – Adds to separate columns on the site
• Divider – Adds a divider on the screen
• Spacer – Adds a spacer on the site.
• RSS Feed – Adds RSS feed icon of your site.

c). Saving Site

The third option is for saving your website. You will need to create an account and signup and if you have a duda mobile login then you can use that also. Add an email account and a password. This will be your new account. Click on SAVE MY SITE.

D). GO LIVE

This is the final step for configuring your mobile website. Once you are done with all changes you will receive a url of your mobile website. It would be in this format - Mobile Site Preview. The next step is to configure the site redirection. The process is quiet simple. You can follow the screen option to make a proper site redirection. Once you are done simply make appropriate changes to your web server and access your website on phone.

Does all this free service. If yes than i can try this either not possible.

Yes this service is free and you can surely give it a try. In case you have any query regrading the steps mentioned above then you can feel free to ask.