Every year Google performs hundreds upon hundreds of search algorithm updates and changes. And for search marketers, knowing what these updates mean can help explain changes in rankings and organic website traffic and ultimately improve search engine optimization.
Most of these changes are minor and will in turn have minor effects on your search campaign results, but also on the experiences of our users and how they interact with search engine results. However, Google does occasionally roll out some major updates that you can’t ignore and with that a much needed strategy overhaul, which is where we come in.
Mobile Friendly and Non Mobile Friendly Search
We’ve said it once and we’ll say it again, mobile-friendly design is an essential part of any truly successful digital marketing strategy. As we reported recently with the new iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus and Apple Watch product offerings, we will begin to see a change in how our search campaigns perform and how we might approach designing for the future of search and mobile.
And if there wasn’t already incentive enough to make you website mobile-friendly, we have yet another which ties together all my prior ramblings about Google updates and the likes. As Google begins testing improvements around the user experience by displaying ‘user-friendly’ icons in its mobile search results.
In the past few weeks, Google has rolled out an icon that warns users that a site is not mobile friendly. Using a smart phone symbol, the search engine has begun to identify and rank website results according to their ability to be viewed on mobile.
Following this initial stage of testing we have seen Google have gone on to test a new icon in the mobile search results that symbolize when a search result links to a page that is not mobile friendly. The icon is a mobile smartphone with a slash through the phone (thanks for that Google).
So What Does This Google Update Mean Exactly?
In a move that clearly speaks for itself; Google is testing to see if they will ultimaltey see a better response from searchers either from showing a mobile friendly icon, a non-mobile friendly icon or no icon at all.
So for all those budding digital marketeers, if you haven’t already joined the responsive search bandwagon and need some assistance in where to get started, why not contact one of our search engine marketing experts to ensure your user has the best experience possible.