The amount of time American’s spent on their smartphones and tablets will increase to two hours 51 minutes this year, while the time we spend on average on desktop and laptop computers is set to drop to two hours and 12 minutes.
If agencies have not already done so, now is the time to starting thinking and planning for mobile being the primary platform for web services. “If your agency has been waiting for a good time to move forward with implementing a mobile first strategy, it’s here,” argues Trechi Johnson, a marketing specialist with AmeriCorps VISTA, a program within the Corporation for National and Community Service in a recent post on digitialgov.gov.
DigitalGov.gov’s mobile application development page is a good place for agencies to start. The page compiles helpful links to the Fedeal Mobile Apps Registry (http://www.digitalgov.gov/services/the-federal-mobile-apps-registry/), sample terms of service for apps, as well as to Sites.USA.gov, where agencies can self-publish websites, including responsive mobile ready web content: http://sites.usa.gov/.
For more background on taking a “mobile-first” approach, here is a recap of a 2012 webinar exploring what that means and looking at it in the context of the federal government: http://www.digitalgov.gov/2012/08/03/mobile-first-webinar-recap/
