This is the slide deck I prepared for my presentation on mobile-friendly SEO at SMX Israel 2015. I hope you enjoyed the presentation! Please tweet me @aroth26 if you have any questions :)
2. @aroth26 bit.ly/mobile-friendly-seo
Ari Roth
• Senior Digital Marketing Manager at
Jerusalem’s DriveHill Media
• SEO
• PPC
• Ecommerce consulting
• Email marketing
• Head of SEO audit efforts at DriveHill
6. @aroth26 bit.ly/mobile-friendly-seo
Mobile Overtakes Desktop in Web & Search
Web
May 2015 Google announcement:
“More Google searches take place on
mobile devices than on computers in 10
countries including the US and Japan.”
October 2015 Google SVP of Search:
"For the first time, we’re getting more
searches on mobile devices than on
desktop“
^ CLARIFIED TO BE WORLDWIDE!
Search
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What Does Mobile-Friendly Mean?
Factors that are considered by search engines
(discussed more by Jonathan):
Usability
Navigational spacing & clickability
Readability without zooming or side scrolling
Content loads on mobile
No Flash
No mobile-only 404s
No faulty redirects
No interstititals
Page load speed
Crawlability
Don’t block Javascript or CSS
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Your Site Isn’t Mobile-Friendly?
No Tags for You!
ANSWER #1: Your site will not have the
“mobile-friendly” label in search results.
Negative CTR effect
Google launched this in November 2014
Bing followed suit in April 2015
#SEOFAIL
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Your Site Isn’t Mobile-Friendly?
MOBILEGEDDON!
ANSWER #2: Your site will rank significantly
lower in mobile search!
On April 21, 2015, Google launched an update
which incorporated mobile-friendliness as a
direct ranking factor in mobile search results.
Depending on the industry, this could have a huge
effect on your organic search traffic.
Bing announced they will follow suit
How big is the effect?
Google: bigger than Panda or Penguin!
12. @aroth26 bit.ly/mobile-friendly-seo
Case Study
Non mobile-friendly Furniture Retailer in Internet Retailer’s Second 500 for last 2 years
Following update, they lost:
-11.44% of their mobile organic traffic
-14.63% of their mobile organic transactions
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Case Study (contd.)
Mobile site was in development at time of update, went live in mid-May
Gains took over a month to be seen – takes time to crawl!
Starting in July:
Mobile organic traffic surged over +30% over the next 2 months compared to the 2 months prior
Mobile organic transactions went up almost +20% from this segment of traffic
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Comparing the 3 Main Options
Option Same URL? Same HTML? Vary:
User-Agent?
Redirects? Rel=“Canonical” &
Rel=“Alternate”?
Responsive Design
Dynamic Serving
Separate URLs
Step by step checklist found here: bit.ly/ari-roth-mobile-seo-checklist
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Google & Bing’s preferred option
Jonathan will go deeper into this option:
Technical to-do’s
Server configuration
Implementation errors
Etc.
Same URL & HTML for mobile & desktop
CSS changes the layout for each browser
Example Site: BostonGlobe.com
Responsive Design
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One URL
Good for SEO
All links to one URL
No crawling / indexing many URLs
Good for sharing
Good for developers
No complicated device detection, redirection, annotation
Easier to maintain
Responsive Design: Pros
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Responsive Design: Cons
Possible slow page load b/c lots of code
3G < Ethernet
Can’t fully optimize for either category:
Changes made to desktop show up on mobile
Changes made to mobile show up on desktop
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Same URL for both mobile & desktop
Different HTML code for each device, based
on server detecting user-agent.
Different images
Different navigation
Different text
Dynamic Serving
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Cloaking is showing different user agents
different content and can cause penalties.
Problem: dynamic serving looks like cloaking!
Solution: Add “Vary: User-Agent” to server
response code
This tells Google that your cloaking is for a
legitimate reason: giving users a better user
experience.
What About “Cloaking”?
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Dynamic Serving: Pros
One URL
Good for SEO
All links to one URL
No crawling / indexing many URLs
Good for sharing
Good for developers
No complicated device detection, redirection, annotation
Can fully optimize for mobile-specific search
intent
Search Analytics: “nearby”, “download app”, etc.
Can fully optimize for mobile-specific user
experience
25. @aroth26 bit.ly/mobile-friendly-seo
High cost of maintenance & more
complicated for SEO
Two sets of code to optimize / update
More complicated for developers
Device detection imperfections
Adjusting user-agent strings for new devices
Worse for crawling
Bots crawl with multiple user agents
Dynamic Serving: Cons
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Usually m.site.com
Different URLs and HTML
Bidirectional annotation:
Rel=“Canonical” from mobile to desktop
Rel=“Alternate” from desktop to mobile
Utilize 302 (temporary) relative redirects
Like dynamic, add “Vary: User-Agent” to
server response code
Example: Sephora.com (minus Vary header)
Separate URLs
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Separate URLs: Pros
Can fully optimize for mobile-specific
search intent
Search Analytics: “nearby”, “download app”,
etc.
Can fully optimize for mobile-specific user
experience
Calls to action
Formatting
Headers
Click-to-call
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High cost of maintenance
Two URLs:
More complicated for SEO
Dynamic Rel=“Canonical” & Rel=“Alternate” tags
Risk of duplicate content if done incorrectly
Links don’t all go to one place!
More complicated for developers
Device detection and redirection imperfections
More complicated for crawling
Bots crawl with multiple user agents
Currently NOT recommended by Bing
Separate URLs: Cons
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Not using “Vary: User-Agent”
Solution: Check server response codes using Fetch
as Google or the SEO Book tool
Bad redirects confuse Google
Solution: Check with Screaming Frog, DeepCrawl,
and/or Chrome device emulation & Redirect Path
plugin
Search Console message about blocking static
resources (July 28, 2015)
Google can’t tell if you’re mobile-friendly if you
block their access to Javascript and/or CSS
Solution: See what they see with Fetch as Google &
use robots.txt to unblock
Tools for Fixing Mobile Errors
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Incorrect canonical and alternate tags could
create duplicate content and “index bloat”
Solution: Check page code via Screaming Frog or
manually using “inspect element”
Will also need to address past index bloat if it
exists by searching for site:m.site.com and
manually removing these URLs in Search
Console. They will still show up when they need
to!
Tools for Fixing Mobile Errors #2
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Check everything using Google’s mobile-
friendly testing tool
Search Console shows mobile usability errors,
mobile crawl errors, and mobile keywords
Slow load is especially bad on mobile
PageSpeed Insights from Google
Which devices need optimization?
Analytics > Audience > Mobile > Devices
Google Tools for Mobile SEO
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Some big companies are making the move
from mobile sites to apps!
Why?
Increase engagement by taking advantage of
mobile usage patterns (see graphic)
Problems:
Psychological barriers to download
Not optimal for SEO, but app indexing and
deeplinking mean it might be more viable for
search long-term
Apps – An Emerging Option
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Unaffected by updates so far – maybe soon?
General belief: give them the desktop version
BUT…
Marketers must make data-driven decisions.
If data shows mobile site converts better and/or
attracts more traffic, do that instead!
A/B test if inconclusive
Tablets – Which Site Do They Get?
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1. Mobile is a huge part of most digital
marketing and isn’t going anywhere.
Prioritize it NOW.
2. Know all your options well before making a
decision.
1. Responsive Design
2. Dynamic Serving
3. Separate URLs
4. Apps
3. Use available tools to help you diagnose
problems.
4. It’s almost lunchtime!
Takeaways
Why it’s important
Review basics of various implementation options available
Start with background
People constantly on their phones
Seems like its been forever, but reality: happened so fast
growth of over 1 BILLION annual smartphone sales in just 7 years
I don’t know about you, but I look at that graph and I’m thinking…
Went from mobile not being on the radar to being one of the most important factors in marketing
How important?
MORE important than desktop!
Usually just new features and clarifications on policy!
Go mobile friendly
Straight from Google & Bing’s guidelines
What happens if you do it wrong?
Next effect – a little something known in the industry as mobilegeddon!
Wait what?!
Panda – 12% English queries
Penguin 4% globally
Let’s say 12.5% as a minimum - that’s at least 1/8 queries that you could lose out on!
Case study
Result: OY!
Luckily for them…
We can see that this is important.
Shifting perspectives
Basically, living in his mother’s basement in the 80s.
We do not want to be him.
Competitive disadvantage
Options
WARNING
Quick guide
Use for dev, boss
Look at the picture – same exact elements, just rearranged
CASCADING style sheets
Why most popular?
Product specs change, product line discontinued, etc.
Have to be downsides because otherwise everyone would do it…
3G / 4G / LTE vs Ethernet
Responsive same URL & HTML
Now Dynamic – diff HTML
Remember cloaking?
Pros for dynamic
CTA color, location, etc.
Drawbacks?
product specs change, product line discontinued, etc.
Same both – same url, diff html
3rd option is separate URLs
Also known as “m dot” sites
302 because original page is still there
What are the advantages?
Same as dynamic serving
Drawbacks?
TOOLS
Alternate versions sneak in
Catch right away - no prob, but what if not?
Other Google tools as well!
Just mobile 404s = bad
Jonathan talks about page speed
Not just one mobile site – QA to make sure it works on top devices at least
Not the main options, but also important
#1 - apps
3 major English markets – 4x to 7x more app activity
SERoundtable for Android with app indexing?
Final factor to consider we touched on earlier
Might need CSS to adjust menu as well
If you zoned out for technical stuff, here’s where you should snap out of it
Be a real professional marketer
Optimizely or Google Content Experiments could not be easier
Check out my slides for pros and cons and tools if you need a cheat sheet