Back on Feb 3, 2015, I told you why you need a mobile-native website today — now, it’s more like you need a mobile-native website today! Literally.
If your site isn’t mobile-native today, April 21, 2015, you might lose a little under 50% of all of your search traffic. Starting today. You’re in luck if you’re on the East Coast: Google’s on PST. You might have a couple hours left.
Rarely does Google actually warn up of an upcoming apocalypse — but they did this time:
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.
In short, if your website is not mobile-native by today, it will no longer show up on Google mobile search. So, you don’t have to believe me anymore, you can go down the rabbit hole, starting with these seventeen articles that will curl your toes with the reality of it all.
Mobilegeddon Checklist: How To Prepare For This Week’s Google Mobile Friendly Update: Are you ready for Mobilegeddon? Google is releasing the mobile friendly update on April 21st. Here is what you need to know
Google: The Mobile Friendly Ranking Algorithm Still On For Tomorrow, April 21st
Google is about to dramatically change how search works on your phone
‘Mobilegeddon': Google to rank mobile-friendly sites higher in search results
Big Google mobile algorithm update on 4/21/2015
NEW: Mobile SEO Visibility – Prepare yourself for the huge Google Mobile Update on April 21st
Google’s mobile-friendly update: is your website UX ready?
Google Mobile Friendly Update Will Shake Up Search Results: The update is coming tomorrow
Google’s Mobile-Ranking Showdown Is About To Kick Off
How Google’S Mobile-Friendly Update Will Affect You (And What You Can Do About It)
Google’s Mobile Update: Know All the Pros & Cons of Your Next Mobile Friendly Site
Google’s Mobile Friendly Algorithm to Have Greater Impact than Panda or Penguin
Google is making a giant change this week that could crush millions of small businesses
Google’s Mobile Update: What We Know So Far (Updated 3/25)
Google Search Change Could Cause ‘Mobilegeddon': Websites which look bad on mobile phones will drop down Google’s search rankings from today – cutting off a major traffic source
Google mobile update: don’t expect fireworks today
Site Not Mobile-Friendly? Kiss Your Google Ranking Goodbye
How do I make my site mobile friendly?
According to Google, if you know the software your website is built with, go directly to the dedicated guide:
WordPress
Joomla!
Drupal
Blogger
vBulletin
Tumblr
DataLife Engine
Magento
Prestashop
Bitrix
Google Sites
More excellent advice directly from Google that can help you avoid avoidable mistakes:
First, learn what it means to go mobile and do it using one of three configuration methods. Choose your mobile configuration.
Understand different devices
Understand key points in going mobile
Select your mobile configuration
Frequently asked questions
Second, make sure search engines like Google can understand your mobile site setup. Signal your configuration to search engines.
Responsive Web Design
Dynamic Serving
Separate URLs
Third, avoid common mistakes we often see on mobile websites. Avoid common mistakes.
Blocked JavaScript, CSS and image files
Unplayable content
Faulty redirects
Mobile-only 404s
App download interstitials
Irrelevant cross-links
Slow mobile pages
Fourth, configure your site to also be friendly on tablets and feature phones.
Tablets
Feature phones
Separate is Not Equal: Go Responsive
If you run your site on Squarespace, you’re covered. Currently my corporate site, Gerris Corp, www.gerr.is, is hosted on Squarespace and it’s surprisingly well-adapted to this update. That said, they suck at other things that I will go into as I adapt my website to be more fully-optimized to its Squarespace 7 platform home.
Otherwise, you will need to check to see if your site is optimized for mobile — according to Google — directly from Google’s mouth using their official Mobile-Friendly Test. No matter what your developers, IT guy, web host, webmaster or technologist tells you, if your site doesn’t pass this test, you’re in imminent danger.
Unfortunately for those of you who have invested on separate-but-equal websites, a regular desktop browser-optimized website and a separate mobile website, Google doesn’t prefer this method. Good for responsive website designers like Unison but terrible for proprietary sites that have segregated their site into different domains, a www.proprietary.com for desktop-optimized content and a separate mobile.proprietary.com or m.proprietary.com sites for mobile-optimized content. Google really does recommend and prefer responsive website design. Want the best bang for your template/theme buck? Go responsive or go home.
Good luck, happy searching, and go git ‘em, Tiger!
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The post Google “mobilegeddon” starts today — are you prepared? appeared first on Biznology.