Not long ago, Google announced  that as of April 21 2015, they will be shaking things up:  “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.”  That’s a MAJOR change.

But what does that mean exactly?

It means that Google will establish preferential ranking for websites that are mobile-optimised. It also means that having a mobile and tablet-friendly  site is no longer a “nice to have” option for your customers—it is extremely important, bordering on mandatory if you want to be found in the search engines.

It is essential to note that Google used the words “significant impact”. They have NEVER done this before !

As people increasingly search on their mobile devices, we want to make sure they can find content that’s not only relevant and timely, but also easy to read and interact with on smaller mobile screens,” a Google spokeswoman said.

 

That is the Google Gods telling us we need to be Mobile Friendly and compliant to get any benefits from them.  I hate to say this but we all must comply if we want to reach our audiences before our competition does.

Even the Wall Street Journal is talking about the effects of Mobilegeddon .

If you want your site to be included in Google’s mobile index then it’s very important that your site is mobile friendly. Once this update rolls out, if your site’s not mobile friendly then you’re going to see
a large drop in traffic.

From a practical point of view, visitors will almost definitely leave your non-mobile friendly website immediately, if it appears unprofessional and they cannot navigate it easily.

Now, what Google will be doing is about to entirely change the way that both your website, as well as those of your customers, ranks on all smartphones & tablets.  The search algorithm is being completely re-defined for mobile devices. 

It is interesting to note that Google initially mentioned this impending change back in November 2014, but the recent formal announcement means that it is now almost upon us.

For those forward-looking businesses that either took the precaution of mobile optimising their websites already, or those that had mobile-friendly websites developed due to the nous of their web developers, then this will be a blessing. Otherwise this could be a curse for your, or your customers’ businesses so NOW is definitely the time to take action before the new Google algorithm takes effect.

Your website search will either immediately start the upward path of higher rankings in smartphone SERPs in the coming months, OR your rankings will immediately free-fall; all depending on the extent and degree of your website’s mobile optimization.

If you are mobile-optimised, and if your competitors don’t yet have fully mobile-optimized websites, you will suddenly be miles ahead of them in the SERPs, specifically on smartphones and mobile-tablet Google searches.

Think about it, Google does not want to show sites to searchers on their smartphones if they are not mobile optimized, so it is essential to make the necessary/recommended changes.

The statistics vary a bit across markets, but as of the publication of this article, more than 40%-50% of all online web traffic is now coming from smartphones & tablets users.

It goes without saying that, this is a major change that is coming and one that business owners everywhere must not ignore.

If you have a Google Webmasters account, you may have in fact already received a notification from Google that looks like this:

Subject: “regarding the mobile usability issues Google found on {domain-name}”

Fix mobile usability issues found on “yourdomainname}

Google systems have tested {XX} pages from your site and found that 100% of them have critical mobile usability errors. The errors on these XX pages severely affect how mobile users are able to experience your website. These pages will not be seen as mobile-friendly by Google Search, and will therefore be displayed and ranked appropriately for smartphone users.

Find problematic pages

View a report of the non-mobile-friendly pages found on your site, and the issues discovered.

Learn about mobile-friendly design

There are a variety of techniques you can use to make your site mobile-friendly. Specifically, look for information about the issues brought up in Webmaster Tools.

Fix mobile usability issues on your site

Google wants to provide users with the best possible search results whenever a keyword or keyphrase is being searched. So this formal change makes absolute sense for users because, let’s be honest, how often do we visit a website on our smartphone and find that it looks awful, and just doesn’t function properly ?

So, be warned … websites that are not 100% optimized for all mobile devices will be penalized in smartphone & tablet search engine rankings progressively after Google launches this new algorithm update .

The good news is it’s pretty easy to see if your site makes the grade…

Visit https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/.

Note: It is advisable that you test and check several  other websites so you can get a better feel for what this tool is trying to tell you.

Want to know how to prepare of Mobilegeddon ? Contact Hymie on 0414-329674 or @ hymie@webmentum.com to find out how we can help you get the edge on your competitors.