96% Of Publishers Not Mobile-Enabled

According to a study conducted by online and mobile ad network Chitika, of the one million largest web domains, only 3.54 percent have a dedicated site for mobile traffic.

Without a targeted site or call-to-action targeted to mobile devices (such as Chitika’s mobile ad unit, which targets mobile traffic on non-mobile sites), mobile traffic is nearly impossible to monetize, meaning that over 96 percent of the Internet is wasting a growing, potentially valuable segment of traffic.

The caveat is that part of the mobile Internet is just the same as the fixed Internet. That's what tablets are all about. A tablet ought to be able to render the traditional web, for example, nearly as well as a PC, with the glaring exception that tablets are designed for "touch" interfaces that could be quite clumsy without mouse navigation.

"Mobilization" is one issue websites have to contend with, but it isn't so clear that designing for touch interfaces will be less important, not so far into the future from now.

The additional issue, beyond simply "mobile optimization," is "touch interface optimization." You might argue mobile optimization--designing sites for smartphone access--is more important. That might be true, but not completely true. Increasingly, smartphones and other connected devices are fundamentally designed around a touch interface, and that might be a more-important consideration.

96% Of Publishers Not Monetizing Mobile Traffic… Yet – Chitika Research