First, what is SEO? Check out our blog article on “What is SEO and why it matters.”
Read our “Comprehensive Guide to Building your Business Presence Online” to learn about all the services you should use to maximize your marketing presence.
Now let’s talk about the huge announcement from Google:
Mobile Search Index Prioritized over Desktop Search Index
Big changes are coming to Google across all their services and at the forefront is the push to a mobile-first world. At the recent Pubcon in Las Vegas, Gary Illyes announced a major change to the Google Search Index: Mobile & Desktop will be separated into 2 different indexes and the mobile index will take priority over the desktop index.
What does this mean for you?
First and foremost, it means business owners absolutely need a mobile friendly website. Without a mobile website, business owners can expect: significantly lower traffic from mobile, and search engine rankings to plummet on the mobile search index. If your website is not mobile friendly, we encourage you to seek out a website designer!
Optimize your Page Speed
Page speed will have a greater impact on search rankings. Google already puts a high priority on page speed and the addition of a mobile index amplifies the need for faster loading pages. While page speed helps your SEO ranking, it also has a significant impact on website traffic, bounce rate and conversion rates. Googles recent studies show that 53% users will wait 3 seconds for a web page to load before they leave. Check your page speed here: https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/ and let us know what you need help with!
Consider switching to AMP
AMP stands for Accelerated Mobile Pages and is an initiative to build lightweight web pages that instantaneously load on any mobile device. AMP has grown significantly from its introduction, starting out only for news articles to now being implemented on sites like eBay, TripAdvisor, NFL and more. The idea of having a webpage load instantly on any mobile device is truly remarkable. As of this moment, AMP does not positively or negatively affect your Search Engine Rankings and with no indication if they ever will. The importance of AMP will come in later months when Google announces their long-term goals. So, keep up to date with everything Google!