Google To Expand Mobile Friendliness As A Ranking Signal

[travelin cat]

The time to make sure your site is mobile friendly is approaching!

Starting April 21, we will be expanding our use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results. Consequently, users will find it easier to get relevant, high quality search results that are optimized for their devices.

[googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com...]

[blend27]

I just did a quick test on 2 EDU of the sites that I know first is not mobile friendly(si.tld) and the second one is(su.tld).

These were the pointers Google Tool Gave for the first site: Not mobile-friendly
Reasons this page is not mobile-friendly

1. Text too small to read
2. Links too close together
3. Mobile viewport not set

I've looked up the same site on a device which has 1,280 x 720 Super AMOLED panel that's five inches across. The text is not readable. I could not read anything unless I have started to pinch the page, which led me to "clicking" on the link that I did not want to, leaving the page all together into the direction where I got lost.

For the second site I got "Awesome! This page is mobile-friendly". I could browse the site no problem, no pinching, read and navigate. Even learned something.

[samwest]

Depending upon your product and niche, be careful what you wish for...
We went mobile (responsive) last August and conversions have since tanked. Mobile users typically do not buy, unless it's from a site where they have saved their cc info like Amazon or iTunes. Even if your signup form or shopping cart is responsive, don't count on more buys, expect less. Unless of course you know some secret that I don't.

[randle]

Sure get the sense their blurring the lines of "ranking for mobile searches" and "ranking", and are pushing for everyone to make their sites responsive (even if some site owners could care less if there ever found in searches done on a "mobile" device.)

Theres more to this than "we just want to make site owners improve the user experience" altruistic spin.

Somethings coming down the pipe, and it will work better the more sites are constructed in the fashion they want them to be.

As always though, whatever the reason don't spend a whole lot of time debating, your always better off taking the hint.

[Leosghost]

Can we name this update already?

"Ostrich" , because it is black and white, ( keeping with the "theme" ) and only someone with their head buried in the sand would not have seen this,( G have been playing / experimenting with this for a while now, hence their use of the word "expand", as opposed to "begin" ) and been caught out by it..;-)

Also it is a bird that runs very fast, somewhat erratically..and despite it's speed, can't "take off" and fly..<=referring to sites that get "caught out" by this..

[EditorialGuy]

Somethings coming down the pipe, and it will work better the more sites are constructed in the fashion they want them to be.

It seems pretty obvious to me: More people are accessing the Web on phones, so it makes sense for Google to encourage phone-friendly pages. For mobile users, mobile-friendliness is a good thing. It may be less of a good thing for Google, but Google has no choice but to look at the big picture.

How important are mobile-friendly design and mobile traffic for site owners? It depends:

- For most people building new sites, using mobile-friendly design from the get-go is a no-brainer.

- For owners of existing sites, the challenge is in knowing what needs retrofitting, what doesn't, and how high such retrofitting should rank on their "to do" lists.

[chrisv1963]

Is a mobile search for mobile phones only or also for tablets? I have a non-responsive website that looks great on tablets and users seem to like it. The lowest bounce rate and highest percentage of re-visits are from tablet users.

[engine]

I'd also like to point out that there's another aspect to this announcement.
App deep linking

It's now a ranking factor, so i'd like to see how that is impacting the smartphone SERPs and users. We ought to be watching that as part of our regular monthly updates.

Starting today, we will begin to use information from indexed apps as a factor in ranking for signed-in users who have the app installed. As a result, we may now surface content from indexed apps more prominently in search. link [googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com]

FYI App Indexing for Google Search [developers.google.com...]

[EditorialGuy]

Is a mobile search for mobile phones only or also for tablets?

Phones (more specifically, smartphones), according to the Google Developers Mobile Guide:

[developers.google.com...]

"By 'mobile', we mean smartphones, rather than tablets and feature phones."

[rish3]

Is a mobile search for mobile phones only or also for tablets?

In this case, I would say it's whatever devices that Google returns mobile formatted SERPS on. You can tell, because at the bottom of the page, there's a "View Google in: Mobile | Classic" section. Or, sometimes just a link that says "Learn More about Mobile Friendly Pages".

There are some tablets where this is the case. I didn't test this completely, but it seems like there's a line at 768 pixels...once a device is at least that wide, it shows regular SERPS.

[londrum]

i keep getting this coming up as "should fix" on google's mobile friendly test:

"Eliminate render-blocking JavaScript and CSS in above-the-fold content"

but all it is is a CSS stylesheet in the <head>, loaded in like normal with a <link rel=stylesheet etc...>

how are you supposed to fix that?
all i can think of is doing all the CSS inline, but you'd have to be a bit crazy to do that

the only other things i'm failing on are "optimize images" and "minify javascript" -- but they are both from google's own watermark image in their custom search box, and their adsense javascript.

...it would be handy if google made their own stuff pass the test to help us out a bit.

[aristotle]

Issues like this one keep cropping up because, from a long-term perspective, we're still in the early years of the internet. In many ways we're lucky to be involved at this stage, because of the opportunities we have, but it means that sometimes we might have to make changes to our sites.

[rish3]

"Eliminate render-blocking JavaScript and CSS in above-the-fold content"...how are you supposed to fix that?

You could do this, at the bottom of the html:

<style>
@import url('/whatever/style.css');
</style>

Personally, though, I think Google is being a bit overzealous on "render blocking CSS". In most cases, the css is a key part of rendering everything correctly :)

[austtr]

@keyplr

your "content rich informational site" remains the same when delivered to the desk-top user and other larger screens, but becomes more streamlined for smaller screens.

I understand the concept, I just have a problem accepting that a 3000 word, 976px wide display page is going to provide a "streamlined" user experience when viewed in a 320px screen.

A smart phone is not a suitable viewing platform for many sites... and never will be. That was the designers intent.

I just hope we don't see this type of site become collateral damage as Google seeks to dominate the mobile arena.

[farmboy]

Depending upon your product and niche, be careful what you wish for...
We went mobile (responsive) last August and conversions have since tanked. Mobile users typically do not buy, unless it's from a site where they have saved their cc info like Amazon or iTunes. Even if your signup form or shopping cart is responsive, don't count on more buys, expect less. Unless of course you know some secret that I don't.

From what I see, mobile users are ... well, different from others.

FarmBoy

[lucy24]

By 'mobile', we mean smartphones, rather than tablets and feature phones.

What about the free-standing google app? You'd think that would count as a mobile search even if you're using it on a tablet.

"minify javascript" ... their adsense javascript

If they're talking about js that lives at google dot com, that's pretty hilarious. But if it lives on your own site, you can easily fix it. The word "minify" doesn't actually mean minify (get rid of all white space); it means compress an external js file with gzip or similar.

I just have a problem accepting that a 3000 word, 976px wide display page is going to provide a "streamlined" user experience when viewed in a 320px screen

Sure, but what are you going to do? Put up one of those retro messages that say "this site is best viewed in Netscape 4.0"? If someone arrives at your site via a mobile device, it's because they're not in front of a computer but they want your information right now.

Besides, why does it have to be 976px? Even on a desktop, forced width ranks immediately after Site Plays Music as a way to make this user leave the site in a hurry, never to return.

[ken_b]

I've beating myself up over this mobile friendly stuff the last few days.

I'm toying with the idea of letting things ride as they are and see what happens.

If this is just about smart phones, I might lose 15% of my traffic and income. Imight be willing to live with that.

If it actually turns out to be smart phones and tablets those numbers could double. That would be hard to take.

The unknown is how much cross traffic there is going from smart phones/tablets to desktop. I don't have an answer to that.

But I do know that I often move from tablet to desktop to get a better experience on a site.

This is a 15 year old hand built static html site, so going full mobile friendly would be a big job.
.

[keyplyr]

Mobile sites are already ranking higher in mobile search. They have been for several months. This announcement only states the ranking weight will increase.

[rainborick]

For a large hand-built static html site, you don't have to make a complete conversion all at once. You could send mobile users to a dedicated mobile site containing just a limited portion of your current content and build it up over time.

I faced a similar situation about 10 years ago with a personal site I'd started in the late 1990's for my wife. While the designs evolved along with my experience, they were still static HTML until about 2006. I wanted to automate the updating process so she could add and revise content on her own (and I felt guilty about not promptly processing her updates every month). So I copied all 700-800 pages into a database and developed my own simple CMS, which meant almost everything was template-driven. This made converting it to a responsive layout pretty simple.

So, as I say, you could create an automated mobile site using one of the popular CMS packages out there. Start with the just most important pages or category from the original version, and then add content as time permits. Eventually you'll end up with everything in a template system that could then be used as the foundation for your primary site and let you drop the mobile version.

[EditorialGuy]

Mobile sites are already ranking higher in mobile search. They have been for several months. This announcement only states the ranking weight will increase.

More accurately, mobile pages. (See Rainborick's post.) Several hundred of our most popular pages (out of 5,000+ pages total) have mobile versions, and in some cases those pages appear to be ranking even higher in mobile search than the desktop versions are in desktop search--probably because there's less "mobile-friendly" competition, at least for now.

For a large hand-built static html site, you don't have to make a complete conversion all at once. You could send mobile users to a dedicated mobile site containing just a limited portion of your current content and build it up over time.

That's been my approach for our main site. We already have a secondary site that's responsive, but it also uses "flat files" (no databases or CMS). My next step will be to take a section of our main site that isn't mobile-friendly and rebuild it as a responsive site with Dreamweaver CC's "fluid grid layout" tools. Once the templates are built, the rest shouldn't be too hard. And after I'm satisfied with the results, I can try the same approach with other sections of our main site as time permits.

[austtr]

@lucy24

If someone arrives at your site via a mobile device, it's because they're not in front of a computer but they want your information right now.

...and the site will still have 3000 words of content on a typical page. With a display of say 10-12 words across a phone screen, that's around 300 lines of scrolling.

That would be an awful user experience and IMO sites like this should not appear in SERP's offered to a mobile user. And conversely, showing a desktop user sites that are specifically designed for mobile viewing would also be annoying (to say the least)

Hence the earlier comment about Google (and all SE's) classifying sites as being mobile friendly or not and taking the SERP's results from the applicable group.

However, when I see the Page Speed tool in GWT automatically apply a mobile friendly test to my non-mobile site(s), I can't help but wonder if the poor "mobile friendliness" result is going to be the same data used to influence the rankings post April 21st.... even with sites that are obviously never intended for mobile use.

[netmeg]

When I'm at the auto shop waiting for my car to be worked on, or (frequently now) in a doctors office waiting for my mother to be worked on, I often pull out either a 7" tablet or my iPhone 6+ to read - and I actually have a stockpile of longform content that I bookmark specifically for such occasions. And I'm never the only one doing that - nor am I a spring chicken. More people are using them to consume longform content than you might think.

[EditorialGuy]

I often pull out either a 7" tablet or my iPhone 6+ to read - and I actually have a stockpile of longform content that I bookmark specifically for such occasions. And I'm never the only one doing that - nor am I a spring chicken. More people are using them to consume longform content than you might think.

When I travel, I often read 19th Century novels on an iPod Touch 4g. The screen is tiny, but the text isn't difficult to read (even by this bifocal user).

IMHO, desktop vs. mobile is less about "long-form" vs. "short-form" than it is about layout and navigation.

[dannyboy]

If this is just about smart phones, I might lose 15% of my traffic and income. Imight be willing to live with that.

Why would you think you'd lose traffic and income? Are you referring to not being able to run ads that would fit on a mobile's screen width?

[blend27]

You have 3000 word article that I cant read on my mobile device(I am guilty of that my self on several sites), guess what, i will take the one that is 300 words one and learn from the other 2 sites in top 3 SERP of the rest.

Ladies and Gentleman, as the keepers of our domains we deserve the right to be uptodate on our technical skills, and not just cause Goog says so.

Mobile, responsive is the way to go. Stop being lazy.

We should not be intimidated by them but lead the way.

[EditorialGuy]

You have 3000 word article that I cant read on my mobile device(I am guilty of that my self on several sites), guess what, i will take the one that is 300 words one and learn from the other 2 sites in top 3 SERP of the rest.

Of course, it's possible that you don't belong to the publisher's target audience. Some sites focus on people who like to read. (I have no way of proving it, but I strongly suspect that the readers who, according to Google Analytics, read 20 or more pages in a session--or who linger for more than 30 minutes in a session--generate more revenue for our information site than readers who flit in and out do.)

Mobile-friendly design (of which responsive design is merely one example) may well be "the way to go" in many cases, but publishers need to be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Would The New York Times be more successful if it aped USA Today, which may be better suited to phone users who consume news in 30-second increments? Probably not.

[blend27]

Would The New York Times be more successful ...

Nope, at all. In fact they force you to pay wall. Not User friendly thing after 10 articles om mobile devices. And they remind you 4 times during those 10.

Vice. Look at that one.

[ChanandlerBong]

This is one you get on board with or you wail and moan like a soggy King Canute.

Go and do a search on a mobile device now, something that brings up your site. If you don't have "Mobile Friendly" beside your site, you have work to do.

Just did it for our site and we're #2 for a key search term we were barely top 10 for midway through last year when we went fully responsive. IMHO, G have already started spreading the ranking juice to those sites already on board. April 21 is the negative stuff going the way of the dinosaurs...

[ChanandlerBong]

Oh, and I just did G's mobile friendly test on 8 of our absolutely mortal enemies/competitors.

ONE mobile friendly like us
ONE 50/50 with big issues
SIX in a mess, whether they're aware of it or not

our niche is famously tech-unfriendly and this will cause total mayhem come April.

[J_RaD]

be goog friendly for their marketshare... OR ELSE!

[graeme_p]

A good responsive design can make a 3000 word article usable on a lot of devices. You can use tabs or an accordion to hide the bulk of the text and show it one heading at a time. Mobile does not necessarily mean a tiny screen - tablets are perfectly good devices for reading lots of text on, and a lot of phones now have large, high resolution screens - even fairly cheap ones are usable for reading ebooks, for example.