Are You Mobile-First Ready?

| SEO

Are You Mobile-First Ready?

 

In the coming months, Google is planning on making a major algorithm update called Mobile-First Indexing, where they will rank a website based on its mobile website primarily, instead of the desktop version of your website.

This means that your website will have to be fully optimised for a great mobile experience in order to achieve high rankings. If you don’t comply with Google’s mobile guidelines you are likely to see a heavy decline in traffic to your website.

Here are 3 tips to help you become more mobile-friendly?

What matters for mobile experience?

1) Speed

For some time now speed has played a major role in a websites user experience, as well as carrying some weight in SEO. But speed means even more for mobile, as mobile users want things faster.

The longer a website takes to load, the more likely your audience will get annoyed and quickly exit your website.

Google is all about giving their users websites that deliver a great user experience, so if your website doesn’t load quickly enough they will rank you down.

2) Site Structure/Navigation

People use mobiles in a different way to desktop computers. With limited space, you really need to think about what’s best for the user. For example, instead of links you need to use buttons, instead of a primary navigation you need to use burger menus.

You need to make it as easy as possible to get from point A to B without any distractions or misleading users. The quicker they get to their destination the better, so make sure you make it easy, otherwise Google might penalise you for it.

3) Make it readable

Your content must resize to the device it is being viewed on. If it does not, then it will be difficult to read from certain devices and will deter users from your website. The content on your site needs to be clear and uncluttered otherwise it will be painful for the user to read.

 

Mobile-First Indexing hasn’t been released yet, but it is imminent. If your website isn’t mobile-friendly then you need to get it sorted as quickly as possible. Even if your website is fully responsive, you should review it to see if there is any improvements you can make as it will have a major impact on your SEO in the near future.

Luke Stanley