Google mobile algo to be bigger than Panda / Penguin as deadline looms

[Whitey]

Gary Illyes retweeted
Aleyda Solis @aleyda Mar 17
Zineb from Google at #smx Munich about the mobile ranking update: is going to have a bigger effect than penguin and panda! [twitter.com...] .

In case you know someone who hasn't heard, you might want to forewarn them of the impending intensity of this.

I wonder if the algorithm will allow a quicker reprieve for those that go under, but are mobile friendly afterwards, or, if it makes those who are putting in late changes more vulnerable, as the algorithm might be baking already, as the deadline looms.

Anyone you know not heard / caring ; other thoughts ?

[netmeg]

Some of our mobile pages are already ranking higher in mobile search than their non-mobile versions are ranking in desktop search. That's just anecdotal evidence, though.

I have the same anecdotes. But 80% of my event site traffic is mobile anyway.

[chrisv1963]

Some of our mobile pages are already ranking higher in mobile search than their non-mobile versions are ranking in desktop search. That's just anecdotal evidence, though.

Some of our non-mobile pages are ranking higher in mobile search than in desktop search ...

[gameon]

Been receiving "Mobile friendliness" warnings for a while from Google. Yes, they are serious, yes, the update is expected to be significant.

[mrengine]

Yes, they are serious, yes, the update is expected to be significant.

I really hope it is significant. We've invested a lot to please all of our users, and it would be nice to see some rewards from Google for these efforts.

[chrisv1963]

Google's Mobile-Friendly Test (and the mobile algo that might be based on this) is more than worthless. I did a couple of tests today:

Test 1: Page looks great on iPhone and iPad. Good user experience => "Not mobile-friendly" according to Google. I can not use it because Google might hurt my online business.

Test 2: Page looks terrible on iPhone and iPad. Broken layout, endless scrolling, ... Worst possible user experience. As a user I would hit my browser's back button as fast as I can => "Awesome! This page is mobile-friendly." Great Google loves this page! This will be good for my mobile users and my business ........

[EditorialGuy]

Google's Mobile-Friendly Test (and the mobile algo that might be based on this) is more than worthless.

Have you tried "Fetch and Render" in Webmaster Tools, using the Mobile: Smartphone crawler? Does it give the same result?

[dethfire]

Personally I am looking forward to this because I know many of my competitors aren't up to speed on this, don't have a mobile style and aren't connected to WMT :D

[hmmricha]

It will have much bigger impact than panda or penguin. Google mobile algo will impact website on mobile devices only not on desktop. Websites which are not friendly will receive drop in ranking.

[keyplyr]

Webmasterworld resizes great on mobile right now

Not on my phone it doesn't. I have to pinch/zoom everything back'n forth and many utilities don't function properly. Android 4.2.4

[Dugger]

According to Google the way this update works is a simple pass / fail of the Google Mobile Friendly Test. It doesn't matter how well your site works in mobile devices or if you have most of the bases covered. If your site does not pass the test which means 100% mobile friendly your site is not considered for inclusion in the mobile serps unless there are no other sites to be found.

[Anon]

Are there any pages to test to see how friendly Google sees your site?

[Dugger]

[google.com...]

[Anon]

My page does come up as mobile friendly but quite frankly it is a mess on a mobile device which pictures out of shape and nothing in order. (Am working on these fixes). As long as Google says it is okay, is it not something I need to urgently work on?

[Dugger]

As far as the algo update is concerned if it passes that Google Mobile Friendly Test you should be ok.

[goodroi]

I just spent a good bit of time looking at different mobile serps for various industries. We are about one month away from the update so there is time for websites to become mobile friendly but I was surprised to see many fortune 500 sites still do not display the mobile friendly tag in the serps.

It makes me wonder if Google will be able to make a significant change. Consumers expect to see certain big brands in the serps and if they don't see them they might think Google's results are bad and switch to Bing. Going to be interesting to see how Google handles big brands that aren't mobile friendly.

[Badger37]

Some interesting thoughts in this thread :)

The BBC have just made the BBC NEWS website responsive (on Monday this week) - reading the comments on the BBC Internet Blog it's upset a lot of people!

Some of the comments make some good points.
As has been mentioned here, a lot of people on a mobile like to use the 'desktop' version of a website - with a responsive site this isn't an option...

People become familiar with the navigation and layout of a site and like it to be the same. Finding their favourite link etc. isn't as easy if it's in a different place or not there at all on a mobile view.

With Pinch/Zoom working so well and with current screen sizes it does seem as if RWD has come too late.

As for Google ranking sites on 'mobile friendliness' I would much rather just zoom on a site that has been ranked on it's content!

[netmeg]

I've spent the past couple days looking at client competitors on my phone. The ginormo-brand guys are all mobile friendly of course, but unless they plan to re-launch in the next 30 days, almost all their smaller competitors are gonna disappear.

[Shepherd]

As for Google ranking sites on 'mobile friendliness' I would much rather just zoom on a site that has been ranked on it's content!

That's perfect, google has gone so far towards demoting sites instead of finding the best content that the results are a bunch of mediocre sites...

[engine]

Yes, there's still plenty of time, although, you have to be concerned about how quickly Google will refresh the sites that are updating in the next month.

I, too, found a good number of top sites without the mobile friendly tag.

I have to feel that Google is forcing this on many sites if they want to appear in the Google mobile serps. I really do no know why they didn't just leave it with sites labelled so that users can decide.

The switch by BBC News has caused a great deal of anger, in part, I believe, because the site looks awful on a desktop. That's a design and development issue that wasn't fully thought through. The BBC are saving a fortune in ongoing maintenance and logistics in no longer having to run and maintain a mobile site and a desktop site. One site for all.

I spoke to a business the other day as their site is not mobile friendly according to Google, yet, it is perfectly viewable and usable on a mobile device, even if you have to scroll. When I explained to them what is likely to happen after 21st April they said they could not afford to redevelop the site at this stage. The site owner was not happy about this move by Google.

I suspect there's going to be an awful lot of consternation and frustration after April 21.

[ken_b]

I've spent the past couple days looking at client competitors on my phone. The ginormo-brand guys are all mobile friendly of course, but unless they plan to re-launch in the next 30 days, almost all their smaller competitors are gonna disappear.

I've looked at that too, and saw similar results. Which is why I am updating to a mobile friendly version of my site. Which turns out to be easier than I thought. Still have a bit to go, so who knows how it will end.

[EditorialGuy]

That's perfect, google has gone so far towards demoting sites instead of finding the best content that the results are a bunch of mediocre sites...

First of all, it's pages, not sites. If you've got 1,000 pages and 50 of them provide the bulk of your traffic and revenue, then make mobile-friendly versions of those 50 pages now and worry about the rest later (if at all).

Second, we don't yet know what the mobile SERPs are going to look like after the changeover. And even then, the mobile algorithm of April 21 will just be a 1.0 release.

How much weight will "mobile-friendly" be given? Will mobile-friendliness trump the other 200+ factors in Google's search algorithm? How far will Google need to backpedal if mediocre pages and mobile-friendly spam rise to the top? Right now, any guess is a stab in the dark.

[Dave_Hybrid]

I seem to have a much different take on all this than the rest of the Internet.

People keep saying things like if you have 10 pages out of 1000 that get the meat of your search traffic just update those, or if you get 5 percent mobile visits from google overall then don't bother.

I have many pages but most rank page 2+ and get little traffic as my site is newish, so I should just reverse my responsive efforts and give up on that... Nope, checking SERPS for my key terms I see sometimes as few as 0 other pages above me with the mobile friendly tag. So my understanding is I should rise to say position 1 after this change and start gaining the traffic from them.

It's not what you will lose, it's what you could gain if your niche is not up to speed. Unless I'm missing something... My understanding is it is on/off. No mobile pass, no displaying in the SERPS, period.

Roll on April 21st, looking like a great day for traffic.

[keyplyr]

I also feel the opposite of many here. As a result of going mobile-responsive, pages that didn't get a lot of traffic before, now do from both mobile and desktop users. Instead of thinking "my pages don't get much mobile traffic so why bother..." I feel it is wiser to be proactive and bring in that traffic by creating content that works well for the ever-increasing mobile audience.

[EditorialGuy]

My understanding is it is on/off. No mobile pass, no displaying in the SERPS, period.

Not exactly. Here's what a Google spokesperson said in a Google+ hangout that Search Engine Land transcribed:

As we mentioned in this particular change, you either have a mobile friendly page or not. It is based on the criteria we mentioned earlier, which are small font sizes, your tap targets/links to your buttons are too close together, readable content and your viewpoint. So if you have all of those and your site is mobile friendly then you benefit from the ranking change.

But as we mentioned earlier, there are over 200 different factors that determine ranking so we can’t just give you a yes or no answer with this. It depends on all the other attributes of your site, weather it is providing a great user experience or not. That is the same with desktop search, not isolated with mobile search.

From: [searchengineland.com...]

People keep saying things like if you have 10 pages out of 1000 that get the meat of your search traffic just update those, or if you get 5 percent mobile visits from google overall then don't bother.

Most of the chatter that I see is more on the order of "If you don't use responsive design, your site will shrivel up and die," but in any case, the importance of having all your pages mobile-friendly is likely to depend on your content, your target audience, and how you earn revenue from your traffic.

It isn't a matter of "Do it" or "Don't bother," it's about looking at the bigger picture and weighing the ROI and opportunity costs.

If you've got a blog or CMS-based site that you can switch to a responsive theme, or if you're starting a new site from scratch, that's one thing. (I changed our static HTML site's related blogs to a customized responsive theme in a matter of minutes.)

If, on the other hand, you've got five or ten thousand pages of static content (including a large number of "long-tail" legacy pages on minor subtopics that rank well but get only a trickle of traffic each), and if your mobile traffic generates very little revenue in comparison to your desktop/latptop/tablet traffic, you may want to consider your overall priorities.

[Dugger]

Not exactly. Here's what a Google spokesperson said in a Google+ hangout that Search Engine Land transcribed:

I watched the Hangout and they made the point in response to a question that it is an off/off switch as far as being mobile friendly.

It is just like you can't be a little bit pregnant. You either are or you are not. Only after it has been determined that you are mobile friendly and join the special pool of mobile friendly websites do the other factors come into play.

[Selen]

I tend to follow the traditional concept and spend much more time creating useful and original content. Websites with mediocre content may initially get more traffic but in time they will drop because people will not want to see them (high bounce rates etc.). When you enter a restaurant that on the outside looks like a palace but inside they serve canned foods only, it won't help much to retain traffic.

I'm sure it's not Google's goal to create a signal for its users that a 'friendly mobile website' = 'mediocre content.'

[Whitey]

Google have published a guide on common mistakes that siteowners make when implementing mobile. It's worth a read....

Avoid common mistakes
01 Blocked JavaScript, CSS and image files
02 Unplayable content
03 Faulty redirects
04 Mobile-only 404s
05 App download interstitials
06 Irrelevant cross-links
07 Slow mobile pages
[developers.google.com...]

[edited by: Robert_Charlton at 4:14 am (utc) on Mar 27, 2015]
[edit reason] fixed link [/edit]

[Selen]

PS - (this is a free business idea that could be worth a million of dollars ;) - I'm surprised Google or other big corporation hasn't come up with something like that, unless they're working on it. As a small site owner my hope is to make a site look good in all mobile devices by just including something like that in the <head></head>:

<meta name="MakeMySiteMobileFriendly" href="{link_to_service.js}">

Now the Javascript would automatically adjust all HTML elements so that they automatically fit the viewport area. I'm sure it's not difficult to do in the HTML5 / CSS3 era. Obviously, the elements may not look or be located exactly as you would want them to be, but it would be very small cost compared to the time saved on making a website mobile-friendly. Millions of small website owners would be happy to have such a solution available. Is something like that available yet? :)

[EditorialGuy]

I watched the Hangout and they made the point in response to a question that it is an off/off switch as far as being mobile friendly.

Here's what Mary, the young woman in the hangout video, said:

"This is going to affect mobile search results. It's not going to affect desktop searches. This means that, when you take out your phone and do a mobile search, all of those search results are going to be affected. So, mobile-friendly sites are going to be shown more prominently, and consequently, sites that are not mobile-friendly are going to be lower."

That seems pretty clear to me. "Mobile-friendly" may be all or nothing, but mobile search results will be not be limited to mobile-friendly pages. They'll just be weighted or adjusted to favor mobile-friendly pages.

[RedBar]

I just spent a good bit of time looking at different mobile serps for various industries.

I've been doing this for a year or two now in my widget sector and it seems to be throwing up differing national attitudes.

Remember this is for my widgets, many UK sites are already completed, most US sites are not! Within Europe there seems to be an almost north/south divide with a good proportion in the north fairly good whereas in the south, oh dear. India and China do not even seem to know about it with only a handful of responsive sites plus Brazil is not fairing much better.

To sum it up, no one, apart from myself and a few others, seem to be bothered at all...hmmm!