The number of mobile users has already surpassed desktop users – and has for several years now. Just last year, Google declared that the number of searches on mobile devices has outnumbered those on desktop in 10 countries, including the US and Japan.
But you’re ready, right? You saw this coming and you made sure your company was ahead of the curve. You have a mobile site. You’ve taken pains and made investments in time, money, and labor to ensure the mobile experience is great for your users.
Unfortunately, while you were ahead of the curve, Google’s recent adoption of Mobile First Index may have pushed you behind it again. But don’t worry. It’s not that hard to fix.
What Is Mobile First Index?
To understand Mobile First Index, you have to understand how Google indexes any site. Meet the Google-Bots, digital spiders that crawl the web looking for websites. When they find one, they carefully index its URLs, identifying keywords and other useful information as they go so that when a user conducts a search for “floppy eared bunnies” Google knows exactly where to find the best sites on those furry balls of cuteness. As you change and grow your site, you can ask the bots to return and re-catalogue your site (although they’ll eventually return on their own).
What makes Google-Bots so effective is how closely their programmers understand real-live humans. This helps the bots know what to look for and how to rate various aspects of your site so that it comes out on the top of search results, or gets buried under pages and pages of other sites.
Until recently, the Google-Bots were programmed to think like a desktop user. Sure, your content got bonus points for also being mobile friendly, but the focus was on providing a solid desktop experience first. Now, however, there are two indexes: one for mobile searches and one for desktop searches. And as the name suggests, mobile results take precedence.
What Do I Need To Do?
The first crawlers programmed for Mobile First Index have already rolled out. As they improve user experience, more will follow. Eventually, Google will return to a single index system, only this time it will be mobile-based, leaving desktop in the dust. In the meantime, more and more users will see results from the new Mobile First Index.
That means you need to be ready to take advantage of these changes, or your rankings will get progressively worse as your competition adapts to these changes. Unfortunately, just having a mobile site isn’t going to cut it anymore.
So what does all this mean for you? If you haven’t already, you need to start building your internet marketing strategy around putting mobile users first.
See What The Bots See
The key to taking action is stepping into the fashionably-coded shoes of the Google-Bots. Luckily, the search giant has made this pretty easy. Just log into the Google Search Console. Use the “Fetch as Google” feature, select the “mobile:smartphone” user-agent, and take a peek at the preview. This will give you a picture of what Google sees on your mobile site – and what it doesn’t.
Do A Comparison
One of the most common changes webmasters may want to make is running a content and link comparison between your desktop and mobile sites. Are the same links present? Do they have the same anchor text? Is all your content on both sites? If not, start adding these pieces to your mobile site.
Having trouble keeping track of two separate sites? Consider switching to a single, responsive site. If you already have one, you’re still ahead of the curve after all.
Speed Things Up
People on the go expect the same quality experience as those who are sitting in front of a stationary computer. Despite things like a lack of Wi-Fi, spotty cellphone signal, and other logistical difficulties, they still want sites to load quickly. With better coverage and faster streaming technology, the mobile world is doing their part. Are you doing yours?
Take the time now to evaluate the efficiency of your site. If there’s anything you can do to help users blaze through it faster, invest in it. That could mean updating to newer technology or cleaning up any unnecessary code. If your site performs better under less than ideal conditions, you’re going to get higher rankings.
What Don’t I Need To Do?
By now, you might be thinking how much of a headache this new Mobile First Index is going to give you in the coming months. The good news is that many aspects of your site don’t need to be changed. Google has made a few things easier.
Mobile Content
Since Google has been moving toward pleasing mobile users for some time, you may have already been receiving ranking boosts for mobile-friendly content. Don’t worry. While the new Google-bots will level the playing field in some ways, you’ll still get those bonuses for mobile-friendly content. So keep up the good work.
Expandable Content
In the desktop world, if users had to do any extra clicking to get to some of your content, that content was given less weight in your overall score. With Mobile First Index, that’s no longer the case. Google understands that sometimes “Read More” buttons actually improve the mobile experience to allow for mobile pages that are less cluttered and easier to navigate on smaller screens.
Conclusion
While Mobile First Index has already become a reality, you may not see much change in your page rankings quite yet. Once Google releases its full force of mobile-trained bots, however, keyword leadership will shift to those who fall in line with the new rules. Stay ahead of the curve by putting mobile users first right now.
