Google Announce Mobile Friendly is Best

Google announced last week that it is expanding their use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal.

Extract from their announcement: "Starting April 21, we will be expanding our use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results."

It would appear that from April 21st 2015 that any site utilising responsive design, will in effect be positioning themselves to outperform those that have not adopted a mobile-friendly approach.

A Timeline for Survival

Google is providing a clear timeline to encourage businesses to adapt or die, making a clear statement that if you are not mobile-friendly, then you run the risk of seeing your hard-earned rankings decline systematically over time.

It certainly appears that Google intends to reward mobile-friendly websites with better rankings in mobile search, however, as time goes on it may be the case that non responsive sites may suffer in terms of a decline in rankings within search rankings.

Responsive is the New Black

Up to now, having a mobile-friendly website has purely been a competitive advantage in terms of mobile acquisition. However, it would seem that with this announcement, mobile-friendly websites will quickly become the norm as businesses adapt to this new move by Google.

If you want to give your business a competitive advantage from April 21st onwards, you will be best placed to ensure your customer journey is as effective via a mobile device as it currently is for a desktop user.

Google has made no secret of the fact that responsive design as its preferred mobile solution and with good cause. A responsive design ensures that the customer experience is optimal through a single interface that translates effectively to both desktop and mobile customers.

It is very possible that responsive websites will be given preference in Google Search over dedicated mobile sites and as such, any business utilising this practice, is in effect, giving itself the best possible competitive advantage.

What to Do

If you don’t yet have a mobile-friendly website, it’s time to get to work. mtc has worked with a plethora of businesses to ensure their websites are future-proofed through responsive design, ensuring they attain a competitive advantage through the ability to serve their customers across all devices.

Is my Website Mobile Friendly?

You can take the test over at the Google Developers mobile-friendly testing tool and get in touch if you need our help.