As mobile service providers improve their networks and mobile phone giants continue to push out new devices, customers are now browsing the web more from their smartphones and tablets rather than traditional computers. It is also becoming important for businesses to tailor-fit their websites to mobile users to increase and improve search engine ranking results.
We measured listed company websites against the Google “Mobile Friendly” criteria in November 2015 and again in May 2016. We selected for this analysis only companies that had a Market Cap over $5m (as at May) and were listed as at May 2016.
There are 533 ASX listed companies over $5m which are NOT mobile friendly!
Over 40% of listed companies at May 2016 do NOT have Mobile Friendly websites. This is down from 48% in November 2015.
Congratulations to the 159 companies that improved their website visitor experience in the six months.
However, the total number of un-friendly websites has decreased by only 30 in the time. This means many new listings, or companies growing their market cap, are not facing this issue.
Overall Results
This shows the percentage of Mobile friendly sites over time:
Size counts, but not much!
Naturally, smaller companies are bigger offenders. Almost 50% of companies under $50m of market cap are not mobile friendly.
BUT – one third of companies with a market cap over $5B are NOT mobile friendly! And this group is the only group that did NOT improve the percentage in the period. Nineteen companies in this group were not mobile friendly in November, and 22 were not mobile friendly in May.
By Industry
This chart illustrates the percentage of sites that are mobile friendly as at November 2015 and May 2016 by GICS industry code:
Industry Progress over Time
During the six months from November 2105 to May 2016, not all industries have made positive progress. Presumably where an industry has gone backwards it’s because the new companies coming into the sample have had a lower percentage of mobile friendly sites than the earlier group:
Commentary on largest industries
The largest industry groups, showing the number of companies tested (at May 2016) and their percentage mobile friendly are:
Less than half (47.7%) of Materials and Energy companies (539 companies) are mobile friendly, and the sector as a whole is a drain on the average. At least their percentage of mobile friendly sites has increased in the last six months from 41.5%.
Is this because some of them have made an effort, or simply because those that have failed are more likely to have not been mobile friendly, and those succeeding are?
Software and Services companies should know about this – and 84.2% are mobile friendly. Surprisingly, though, 16 companies in this sector still don’t seem to have worked out some basics of their own industry! They are pipped at the post for the best sector prize by Consumer Services with 84.8% friendly, and only 7 companies in that sector not friendly.
Capital Goods companies are the worst performing sector, with just 44% mobile friendly, and 38 companies not passing the test.
Sample Data
The sample is 1176 companies in Nov15 and 1305 companies in May16.
Our data indicates there are 1509 companies with a market cap of over $5m as at May 2016. Market Cap is as published by Yahoo Finance. The website tested is the website in the ASX data. Companies not tested either have no recorded website in the ASX data, or there was an error running the tests, or they are currently suspended, or their GICS code is “Not Applicable”. Not all companies (only 1275 at May 16) are included in the “by industry” comparisons as GICS codes are not all known.
Follow Up
We will re-run the tests in another six months and update the results.
Meanwhile, if you’d like to know where a particular company stands, please ask us. Get in touch with us at clientrelations@irmau.com or +61 2 8705 5444, or see www.irmau.com for more details.
Online Investor Engagement Specialists
