In recent times, Mobile SEO is increasingly gaining prominence when it comes to important factors in search engine rankings. And since Google listed mobile compatibility as an essential factor to order, it became necessary to optimize your web pages for mobile devices. Statista even reported that over 3 billion people in the world use smartphones to access the web.
Furthermore, mobile SEO is crucial to lead generation leading to online sales as more people buy items on the go. As expected, the Google algorithm now gives preference to mobile-optimized pages. And if any business site wants to rank better, mobile SEO is one of the indispensable factors to consider. Therefore, this article can serve as a guide to what mobile SEO is about.
What is the importance of Mobile SEO?
In the true sense, a skillful SEO agency should note that mobile SEO is hardly a different type of SEO since over 58% of Google users use mobile devices. So, SEO itself should favor mobile devices by default. Moreover, both the designer and the SEO agency experts need to factor in this when building and optimizing sites.
A mobile-friendly website is essential for a fantastic user experience, lesser bounce rate, and increased return visits. However, you are missing out on users who spend 70 of their time on mobile devices without mobile optimization. At the same time, losing these customers also implies a decreased conversion rate and revenue generation.
Google’s Mobile-first Index
In response to mobile devices’ prominence, in 2018, Google launched a mobile-first index that overhauled its entire algorithm to favor mobile devices. This change wasn’t much of a surprise to professional SEO agencies in Sydney, following the trend since mobile searches exceeded desktop in 2015. Moreover, mobile devices added more flexibility to page use.https://www.statista.com/statistics/330695/number-of-smartphone-users-worldwide/
For example, mobile searches produced high-quality and relevant content, well-spaced text, and a more effortless bidirectional scrolling. No doubt, the future of searches is mobile devices. An SEO agency must design and optimize business sites accordingly. At the same time, when Google does not define tablets as a mobile device, mobile SEO is really about optimizing pages for all devices.
How to Configure a Mobile Site
Isolate mobile URLs with the ‘m.’ configuration
The journey to site configuration for mobile compatibility begins by separating URLs with the ‘m.’ setting. While you have a desktop site, you should create a parallel mobile site with its unique URLs. Similarly, the site automatically determines the user’s device and redirects to the appropriate URL, either mobile or desktop. However, newer technologies have taken over now.
Dynamic Serving
Another option to configure your site to become mobile-friendly is by dynamic serving. This separation is possible through a different HTML/CSS on the particular device in use. In other words, even when we input the same URL, the server displays the suitable option for the device in use. However, at times, dynamic servers can have glitches of the wrong display to mobile users.
Responsive Design
Responsive web design is the latest technology for site configuration for mobile SEO. It tailors the page for the particular user. The structure here involves automatic adjustment of page layout and content to the specific device. Whereas, there is no need for multiple URLs or separate HTML versions since responsive designs have the following benefits
- Responsive designs bring all the contents to the same URL while supporting sharing on social media and digital marketing
- Responsive designs do not need canonical tags and reduce duplicate content issues with your site
- It presents a highly user-friendly interface
- Responsively designed pages follow Google’s love for such web designs and therefore favors sites with such technology
Mobile SEO Best Practices
Therefore, it is essential to optimize your site for mobile searches using some best practices and tactics. Below are some best practices to give the best mobile experience to your users
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Optimize User Experience on Mobile Devices
Using a responsive web design, your site server settings adapt the design to all users’ devices. Similarly, this technology can automatically adjust the screen size without losing the position of all the page elements. The essential components with the best positioning include menu design and the call-to-action buttons for the best user experience.
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Mobile Content
Google does not love different content for desktop and mobile devices. As a result, there is no more hiding for all your site contents.
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Indexing
Indexing is an integral part of search engine rendering, with Google bots able to crawl and index all sites’ contents. Crawling and indexing is the ability of the bots to understand and interpret text, images, and videos on mobile devices. Similarly, remember that images should have alt tags, while text contents should have titles and meta-descriptions.
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Voice Search
You should also optimize your site with voice search in mind. Presently, Google Assistant works for voice search, requiring the right keywords, including long-tail ones and questions. At the same time, voice search is also working for tablets, smartphones, and other assistant devices such as Echo from Amazon.
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Fast Load Speed
The page speed is a top-ranking factor in your chances on the search engine result pages. Not only is the loading speed important for desktop devices, but it is also a common factor for mobile devices. Overall, Google recommends that all sites load in under 3 seconds, achievable with the responsive web design. You can check your site speed by clicking here.
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All internal links and redirects work
The factor of internal links involves ensuring that there are no error pages and that the crawler can work on all your pages. In addition, mobile SEO should give your visitors the best user experience by validating all links and redirects effectively.
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No Interstitials
Interstitials are pop-ups and interruptive advertising to the end-user. However, these items can become annoying, frustrating, and disruptive to the user. Thereby, too many interstitials harm user experience, causing them to leave, resulting in a higher bounce rate. At the same time, Google is increasingly disregarding intrusive pop-ups if they don’t add value to the page experience.
Conclusion
SEO agencies must esteem mobile SEO as a must-have for digital businesses. At the same time, a great user experience is essential for marketing brand products and services. Moreover, it supports other benefits such as higher rankings on search engines, increased conversions, and increased traffic. However, without optimized mobile pages, SEO success will be nearly impossible.