Has Your Website Been Affected by #Mobilegeddon?

In April 2015, Google rolled out its latest update, which has been aptly named ‘Mobilegeddon‘. This new algorithm was designed to improve the browsing experience of mobile device users by increasing the traffic for websites that are optimised for mobile and penalising those that are not. The update follows digital trends that show the transition from desktop to mobile search. Digital marketers and businesses now have to optimise their websites to respond to all types of mobile devices in order to rank highly on search engine results pages (SERPs)

How To Check If Your Website Has Been Affected

It is easy to find out whether your website has been hit by the new algorithm by checking your website’s mobile rankings. Take a look at the current ranking of your top keywords, if you’ve dropped out of Google then you have probably been affected by the update. You can also use Google’ Mobile-friendly Test tool to check your site’s mobile compatibility.

If your website has not suffered then you should not become complacent. Your website may be affected at a later date as the update is being rolled out over several months so it is important to ensure that your website is mobile friendly just now so you are not affected by the update if and/or when it does hit.

What Can You Do If Your Website Has Been Hit By Mobilegeddon?

If you think that your website has been affected by Mobilegeddon then you will need to start a recovery process which will hopefully see your rankings restored within a few months.

If your website has been affected by Mobilegeddon or you would like to prevent it from being affected, here are four steps you can follow to ensure that your website is mobile friendly.

1. Visitors to your website should not have to magnify the page so they can read content. The recommended font size should be at least 14px and buttons 44x44px. A mobile site should condense the information from a full desktop site so you should carry out research to find which parts of the website are most important to users. You should also always include a ‘view in desktop’ link in case users to want to visit your full website.
2. You can use the viewport meta tag so the visitor’s browser knows how to scale the page depending on the dimension of the device the user is using. Also, make sure that your content isn’t wider than the display or users will need to scroll across the page.
3. Don’t use incompatible plugins, such as Flash which is not supported by mobile browsers.
4. Keep links properly spaced so visitors do not accidentally press the wrong link – clicking with a curser is a lot more accurate than clicking with your thumb.

What Next?

The algorithm is likely to be tweaked continuously as more people use mobile devices to browse the web. At the moment the Google update does not consider factors such as page load speed but it very likely to do so in the future. It is now impossible to ignore the impact this update has on search engine optimisation and the importance of making your website mobile friendly so it can maintain search rankings.

If you have any concerns about your website, or are looking to set up a website for you business, then Adeo Group can help. Our web development team are experts in creating responsive designs with SEO. To find out more contact us today.