If your business does not have a mobile-friendly site then website ranking can and will likely be affected. If your business or association does have a mobile responsive site (and we hope you do), then you should focus on optimizing with the tools and analysis readily available. Since 2013, Google has been preparing webmasters to make their sites mobile-friendly in order to rank well in mobile search. They are already using Mobile-Friendly labels in search results pages to guide users toward compatible sites.
According to Jennifer Leggio, Senior Director Security Marketing Strategy, Cisco, “Mobility, the cloud, and the Internet of Things create significant opportunities for businesses to expand and also for consumers to enjoy.” We require seamless interaction with our devices, and with Windows 10 and Apple Pay making their entrance into the mobile payment market, our smartphones and tablets will become even more prevalent.
Google is now notifying webmasters via Google Webmaster Tools and email to fix their mobility issues. According to this article on mobile notifications to webmasters from Search Engine Land, this move seems to indicate an imminent mobile ranking algorithm.
“They also launched a mobile friendly testing tool, mobile usability reports in Google Webmaster Tools, and mobile-friendly labels in the search results,” Search Engine Lands writes
Below is a copy of the usability notice being sent to webmasters:
HOW TO OPTIMIZE YOUR MOBILE SITE FOR SEO
If your normal site is well optimized then a lot of the same SEO best practices apply to your mobile site. We highly recommend the use of a responsive site when possible, but most all suggestions below can be implemented to make a site mobile friendly.
These best practices include improving the mobile experience by including:
- Site Design for Mobile and larger buttons
- Optimize Meta Titles and Descriptions for shorter character displays
- Optimize for Local Search
- Responsive Web Design
- or a Separate mobile URL for devices if indicated, but can lead to canonical and update concerns
It is also very important to pay attention to these technical issues:
- Page Speed
- Enable Javascript, CSS and Images
- Use Schema.org structured data
- Mobile site configuration and Navigation
- Dynamic Serving
For more information on each of these topics, please refer to this in-depth Moz article on Mobile Optimization
Have questions on how to best optimize your mobile site? Let us know in the comments below.