Optimizing Your Website for Mobile SEO
Previously, Google crawled and indexed your website using the desktop version of each page. This was fine for most sites, but it caused some issues with mobile users.
Now, Google primarily uses the mobile version of each page for indexing and ranking purposes. This change is called Mobile-First Indexing.
1. Make Your Site Mobile-Friendly
If you have a responsive website that uses media queries to switch between different versions of a page, Google should already be evaluating your site for mobile-first indexing. However, you should still make sure that your content and metadata match between your desktop and mobile versions.
For example, a desktop version of your page might have a full article with structured data markup and hreflang tags, while the mobile version may have less content. This could cause problems when the mobile-first index takes effect, so you should check your pages regularly for errors.
To do this, use Google’s free Mobile-Friendly Test tool to see how mobile friendly a specific URL is (either your homepage or any page within your website). You can also run an audit with the help of an SEO Expert San Diego like LOCALiQ.
2. Optimize Your Metadata
Google uses the mobile version of your site’s content (crawled with a smartphone agent) to index and rank pages, so it’s important that your metadata is mobile-friendly as well.
Make sure that your title and meta descriptions are optimized for mobile search, focusing on keywords and relevancy. It’s also important to avoid using any noindex or nofollow tags on your mobile site.
Ensure that your font size is at least 16px so that visitors can read the text on your site without having to zoom in or scroll. Also, be sure to use canonical tags to prevent duplicate content issues when using multiple URLs for different versions of your website (e.g., your main and collection product pages). This will help you keep your mobile SEO optimized.
3. Use Hreflang Tags
Imagine you’re browsing online for a new pair of jeans. You find the perfect pair and want to know how much they’ll cost in your local currency. If you’re lucky enough to have a website with the right language and region settings, you can see the price displayed in your currency without having to look at another page.
However, this only works for sites that use hreflang to indicate the correct versions of pages for their target audience. This is a very effective strategy that can unlock new traffic and help you grow your business globally, but it’s important to make sure that you’re using hreflang correctly. If you’re not, it could backfire and result in a loss of search engine traffic. To avoid this, be sure to use a Vary HTTP header.
4. Optimize Your Images
A page’s loading speed is also a major ranking factor. Therefore, optimizing your images for mobile SEO is crucial. This means that you should use the same size and format for all of your images, and make sure that they have descriptive alt text.
Invisible parts of a page, such as structured data and metadata markup, also have a significant impact on a site’s ranking. Ensure that these are consistent across all platforms.
When Google crawls your site, it checks the mobile version of your page first. This is called mobile-first indexing. Don’t worry, this doesn’t mean that Google now has two indexes – the desktop and mobile versions are still used to determine rankings. However, the mobile-first index will have a bigger impact on your rankings.
5. Optimize Your Speed
If your site’s speed is too slow, mobile users will get frustrated and leave. This is why optimizing your site’s loading speed is essential for good mobile SEO.
This includes using a content delivery network (CDN), minimizing image file sizes and removing unnecessary elements from your page code. Additionally, you should always take any errors that you see in your Google Search Console reports seriously and make an effort to resolve them quickly.
Finally, be sure to remove any intrusive ads that could negatively impact the user experience on mobile devices. Ads that hide content, full-screen scroll-over ads and auto-playing video ads are all bad practices that should be avoided for best results. You should also avoid large pop-ups that require the user to take an action in order to access your content.