Google’s Mobile-Friendly Algorithm Update Is Coming Soon

Google’s April 21 launch of its new mobile-friendly ranking algorithm is quickly approaching, and Web designers and marketers should be certain that their websites are ready in advance of this date.

According to Google Webmaster Central, this will be the most significant mobile algorithm change to date. It has been said that this update will be bigger than either Panda or Penguin, so it’s essential to do everything possible to position websites to be mobile-friendly in order to avoid being penalized in Google’s search results.

How can dealerships prepare their websites for the upcoming algorithm change?

In general, a mobile-friendly website is one that is easy to use on a mobile device. Websites should be designed to ensure that common tasks can be completed without difficulty on all devices and screen sizes. Consider what objectives a customer is most likely to have when visiting your website, and run through these steps on a mobile device. Is it easy to search for products? Is your business contact information readily accessible and readable on a mobile device? Can you move through the website easily, or do you need to zoom in frequently to see links or read essential information?

Google recommends using “responsive web design” (RWD) over other design patterns. One of the primary benefits of RWD is that you only need to maintain a single version of your website, as opposed to one for desktop and one for mobile. RWD has become the industry standard, and it allows for consistency of information while adapting the display on your website to respond according to the screen size that is being used by the visitor.

One important aspect of the mobile-friendly algorithm is that it will analyze mobile compatibility on a page-by-page basis, as opposed to on a website-wide basis. In practical terms, this means that if your website has some mobile-optimized pages and some non-optimized pages, Google will look at them separately and will promote the pages that are optimized. Therefore, an entire website won’t be penalized even if specific pages are not considered mobile-friendly. Due to the fact that in some instances there are pages that are difficult to optimize for mobile, this page-by-page analysis will save many websites from being penalized overall, and will still allow for the optimized pages to benefit from the ranking algorithm.

How can you test whether or not your website is considered mobile-friendly by Google before the April 21 algorithm update?

Google has provided the following mobile-friendly test page. If you are unsure about the current status of your website, a good place to start is to run this test to see whether or not it is considered mobile-friendly by Google:

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

Unfortunately, the test is said to have some flaws, but it still provides a general gauge of a website’s performance on mobile.

A second method for testing your website is to search for it on a mobile device. If you see the “mobile-friendly” label in the search results, then Google considers your website to be optimized for mobile, and you’re prepared for the algorithm change.

Lastly, you can run your website through Google’s Mobile Usability Report, which is found in Google Webmaster Tools. This will provide you with relevant recommendations so that you can address any specific mobile usability issues that exist on your website and make the necessary changes.

It is highly recommended that you monitor your metrics carefully, both leading up to and following the rollout of the April 21 algorithm update, to keep tabs on how your website is being affected by the change and to make any adjustments accordingly.

Now is the time to run these tests to ensure that your website will benefit from Google’s upcoming algorithm change, as opposed to being penalized and suffering a lower ranking in the search results. We recommend that you run the tests above and make all the necessary changes in advance of the April 21 launch. Not only will having a mobile-friendly offering allow your website to rank higher in Google’s search results, but it will also provide the growing number of mobile users with a positive experience that will keep them coming back to use your website in the future. If you fail to make your site mobile-friendly before the algorithm update, your rankings and mobile search visibility may be significantly reduced. The reality is that the rise of mobile shows no signs of slowing down, and the expectation to have a mobile-friendly website will only increase in the future.