Go Mobile-Friendly or Face SEO Penalty by Google

It’s Google that controls the WHOLE GAME.

It’s time to get responsive or be ready for a Google slap. Google’s actually on an uncompromising mission. As of now, over 60% users use mobile devices to search or use the internet, and Google’s algorithms have to adapt to these web usage patterns. The buzz has already shaken the tech-world: Google is introducing a penalty for web pages that are not mobile friendly on April 21 2015.

What exactly the Google Mobile Penalty is?

Google has been changing its ranking algorithms since December 2000. Penalties can be automatic or manual. With manual penalties, you’d possibly be told, but you may not always know you’ve been targeted if the cause is algorithmic. And believe me, these penalties have taken even the most experienced SEO professionals by surprise, facing sudden and huge drops in SEO rankings and organic traffic.

How would Google Mobile-friendly Penalty affect your ranking and Organic Traffic?

Your best content is trashed if it doesn’t appear on your target’s personal gadget. Top Marketing strategists have been lately focusing on going responsive so as to be on the competitive edge. And if you haven’t, Google is all set to penalise you. Have a look how:

• Google is set to expand their use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal
• The change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide
• This is going to significantly impact the search results, rankings, eventually resulting in organic traffic loss
• Web-users will find it easier to get relevant qualitative search results that are device optimized
• Mobile search results conducted from mobile phones would promote mobile friendly websites
• Mobile unfriendly websites would get demoted in mobile search rankings

Don’t panic, you can overcome this Google Mobile-friendly Penalty!

It’s just the right time to get responsive and be responsive, in either of the two ways:

• Redesign your entire website for mobile responsiveness, OR
• Create a mobile-friendly version of your website and redirect mobile visits there

Quick Tips to get this done:

• Ask your developer to find out how mobile friendly your website/webpage is
• If your webpage shows up as mobile friendly, there’s nothing to worry about
• If not, plan to go responsive
• Use a template that is built for mobile and desktop which redirects visitors to the mobile site when they are on a mobile device
• Canonicalize mobile page templates by using the desktop URLs
• Remove additional page elements to make the experience less cumbersome (i.e. unnecessary pages, navigation options, content, images, etc. on the desktop version
• Lastly, remember not to cut corners for this; as there is no point if the process wastes your resources and doesn’t result in an enhanced UX

Takeaway: Marketo is an amazing tool to create beautiful Landing Pages, Mailers, and more other Web Assets that are responsive and quick. Click here to know how.

Want to go mobile friendly right now?