Google is going mobile first

Whilst it didn't come as much of a surprise, it was still big news during October 2016 that Google would be taking a step away from a desktop primary index and indexing mobile versions instead.

Up until now Google has always relied on a desktop version in order rank pages, even if the user has made the search on a mobile device. But no longer.

Why have they done this?

When you think about how mobile the world has become, it makes sense for Google to make this move. So many of us surf the internet whilst in a café, out for a walk or during the commute; and having the pages displayed to us in a mobile friendly format. Well that could be a game changer for mobile surfers.

At the moment this is simply a warning about what is to happen, so, businesses have time to make the relative changes that are needed to make the most of this move to mobile.

What could it mean for me and my business?

Interested to learn what it could mean for your business? We have put together some of the things that we think it could mean.

Make a mobile page
It is quite common for site owners to make a mobile page which is simply a lighter version of their desktop page. Whilst this has worked okay for the time being, for the future you may want to take a closer look at how the content from your desktop page transmits into your mobile page. If you don't do this, then you may see that you lose traffic! If you have a responsive design website, you should find that this works fine despite these changes.

Keep the data structured
Often people remove any structured data that they have from their mobile version, making the page lighter. However, with these changes being introduced there is going to be the need to keep this structed data on mobile pages.

So is the desktop index leaving us?

It has been confirmed that we won't be waving goodbye to the desktop index. However, the rankings will not be updated as frequently as the mobile index. Meaning that the mobile index will be a fresh and up to the minute reflection.

We don't know when to expect these changes to come into effect, however, there is a good chance that Google will give us plenty of notice before they arrive. We are excited to see what this means for mobile websites and how it can impact on the amount of visits that fully responsive mobile websites receive.

Not sure whether your website is up to scratch? Why not get in touch with us here at Dino Media and see if we can make sure that your mobile pages are going to come up high on the ratings.