I’ve been writing about the importance of optimizing your website for mobile for several months now, and March’s roundup post includes even more evidence that mobile optimization should be a top priority.
Earlier this month, Google sent the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) world into a frenzy when they announced, “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.” Search Engine Watch has even jokingly referred to April 21st as “Mobilegeddon,” offering readers tips on how to prepare for the upcoming algorithm update.
Sticking with Google’s Cellpocalypse 2015, Search Engine Land put together a helpful post clarifying the new mobile-friendly algorithm update. Key takeaways from the article:
- The algorithm will begin rolling out on April 21st and will take a few days to a week before it is fully implemented.
- The update will determine whether sites are mobile-friendly or not on a binary basis. There are no degrees of mobile-friendliness, you either pass or you don’t.
- The easiest way to check whether your web pages are considered mobile-friendly is to see if you have the mobile-friendly designator next to your site’s listing when conducting a search from a mobile phone.
As you can see in the search results to the right, the first two listings are labeled “mobile-friendly” while the third listing is not. One would imagine that following the April 21st update, the bottom result will be replaced by a page that’s considered mobile-friendly.
If you don’t see the mobile-friendly designation next to your result when conducting a search, it would be a wise idea to clear that up sometime in the coming weeks.
Now, switching gears away from mobile and to some of the other topics being discussed this month, here are a few of the marketing, SEO, and social media articles you might have missed:
On the traditional SEO side of things, Search Engine Watch published an article highlighting the 7 must-have SEO reports in order to meet today’s search optimization challenges. Not only are these reports important, they’ll help guide your SEO campaign, determine which goals are most attainable, and how you should prioritize your efforts.
You most likely already have access to Google Analytics for your site, but are you actually taking advantage of the information you have at your disposal? Chances are you’re not. Fortunately, Quicksprout has a pretty comprehensive infographic on how you can use Google Analytics to improve your marketing.
With all the SEO advice floating around it’s easy to get bogged down in tactics and methodology and forget the marketing basics. Search Engine Watch published an article encouraging keeping things simple, and suggesting 3 “easy” questions to ask before beginning an SEO campaign.
Lastly, ShoeMoney published a great blog post reminding marketers that email remains king when it comes to getting your message out. Although the social media side of things tends to get more attention, it’s worth a quick reminder that permission based email marketing can still yield amazing results for businesses of all sizes.
That’s it for this month’s roundup. You’ve got a few more weeks before April 21st rolls around and “Mobilegeddon” is upon us. In the meantime, make sure your site is up to date, then settle in and get ready for the inevitable “I can’t believe we all panicked so much over this update” backlash.
As always, if I missed anything, please let me know in the comments below.
About the Author: Jason Arango is the Director of Marketing for GJEL Accident Attorneys. He’s been involved in online marketing since 2007, and has worked with companies such as Village Voice Media and Clear Channel Communications.