Priyanka Shitole

After years of experimentation and usability testing, Google has decided to roll-out “mobile-first” indexing.

What does this mean to your business?

Google, or any search engine, “indexes” or records websites as a tool or resource or business entity for specific products or services. Google also records the content on these websites. Some websites have a separate “mobile website” or “dynamic content” for mobile devices compared to the desktops. Until now, Google kept a record of what content a user sees on a desktop devices. Starting now, Google will record ONLY what a user sees on mobile devices.

What does this really mean? If you have a mobile-friendly website that delivers the same content to all devices, then you will not see much of a change in your search results. But, if you show different content on desktop than on mobile devices, then Google will consider the mobile version as the primary source of record.

This means, if you don’t have a “mobile-friendly” website, then you are in trouble for sure. Based on the algorithm change in October of 2017, Google has started penalizing websites that are not optimized for mobile devices. And since Google has decided to opt in for “mobile-first” indexing, then that is a double-whammy.

While Google has made this drastic change in its search algorithm, Facebook has decided to focus mainly on posts from your friends and family than crowd individual timelines with posts from businesses, brands and media. The businesses getting traffic from Facebook will see a huge drop in the social activities and visits. As a result, it is more important than ever to be found in search organically, and not get penalized for not being mobile-friendly.

If you already have taken care of website optimization for mobile, then you need to notify Google so that your mobile version will be indexed.

If you dont have a mobile-friendly website, then now is the time to act.

We’re here to help guide clients through this transition.