Have you looked at your website on a mobile device like a smartphone or tablet lately? If you have and it wasn’t good, it’s really time to do something about it.
Although Google won’t reveal exactly how they determine search result rankings, they have always maintained that webmasters who want their sites to rank well should concentrate on serving the needs of their audience rather than SEO (search engine optimization) “tricks” designed to appease search engines.
A 2014 survey on internet trends revealed that mobile devices account for 25% of all web usage (up from 14% the year before). So as more of your audience accesses the internet on mobile devices it is increasingly important to make sure they have a good experience. Mobile-friendliness is so important that it was the number one thing in my list of 5 things every website needs.
A few weeks ago Google doubled down on their commitment to people over search engines and announced that they are increasing the importance mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This means that having a mobile-friendly website will quickly become absolutely necessary in order to show up in any desirable position in search results.
Starting April 21, we will be expanding our use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This change will…have a significant impact in our search results.
Luckily Google has an easy to use tool to help you determine how mobile-friendly your website is. Visit the link below, enter your website’s URL, and click the Analyze button to find out.
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/
If the result is good, congratulations! You’re ready to reap the rewards that come with higher search engine rankings and a website that’s accessible to an audience that continues to grow.
If the results were not so good, don’t worry too much. Google has some great resources to help you resolve any issues they find. Here’s a link to Google’s Mobile Guide for making mobile-friendly websites. They’ll also offer how-to information specific to how your site was created when you run the mobile-friendly test. Just look in the last column, labeled “Make this page mobile-friendly”, under your results. (See the screenshow below)
Making these sort of changes on your own can be pretty intimidating. But remember, I’m always here to help. In the end, a mobile-friendly site is not only better for your customers (and therefore better for your business), now it’s also better for search engine ranking.
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