Since this article was first published, a significant number of people are now accessing websites via their Smartphone, increasing the importance of  developing for Smartphones, as much as Desktops.

If your Website Stats show that most of your visitors are viewing your website via Smartphones, then there is a good business case for Accountants to develop their web design, based on how it looks on these devices, rather than on Desktops. This is for no other reason than, these type of visitors, most likely, would prefer the scrolling approach to Websites (auto responsive), rather than the zoom approach (fixed width).

However, if most of your visitors are accessing your Website via a Desktop, then, technically, there is little benefit to be gained from an auto responsive design. Auto responsive websites will tend to enlarge any graphics and fill the browser window, typically, with your Banner picture and navigation menu. This means, visitors have to scroll down the page (below the fold) before they can read any content. This can be annoying to some people.

With all new websites now being developed using auto responsive technology and a large amount of older websites being updated to this format, the typical web visitor has now been conditioned on what they should expect from a modern website.

Not wanting to appear out of touch and an acceptance that, their Website is very dated looking, is the number one reason why Accountants decide to update their website to something more modern.

Mobile friendly websites are developed using the same code as Desktop Websites. Therefore, if a “so called” mobile friendly web page has been designed with lots of content and graphics, then it will always load slower than a traditionally developed web page with less content i.e. it is the amount of content that dictates page load speed and not some special code.

However, since many people may be visiting your Website on slower mobile devices (compared to a newish Desktop spec), it would make sense to, perhaps, simplify your page design, include less graphics and hide certain content areas to help improve page load times on slower mobile devices.

If your website is old and tired, needs a complete rethink to meet your new business objectives and a budget has been allocated to the project, then your only choice is to go down the auto responsive route. Fixed width websites are now a thing of the past.

Although for the majority of Accountants, there are, technically, no tangible benefits for doing so, as discussed above, since 2014, there has been a significant shift to auto responsive websites by the entire Web Deign industry. Auto responsive is now the new standard and would be absurd for any Accountant Web Designer not to adopt it.

From a Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) point-of-view, it also makes sense to have an auto responsive website. Google now base their indexing on Mobile devices and having a “Mobile friendly” website, earns you some extra “Brownie points” with them.