Be careful of those promoting mobilegeddon as it is only a marketing exercise to scare people to sell services. Don't get tricked.
There's two schools of thought with Google's coming update on the 21/4/15. Google has stated mobile friendly will be a ranking factor.
Now of course as per usual with Google there's a lack of information and people are using this as an opportunity to scare people into spending money, perhaps unnecessarily. There are two schools of thought.
1. The first theory is Google is simply making mobile friendly a ranking signal. This means sites that are mobile friendly will rank better and thus sites that aren't mobile friendly will rank lower. Sites in this case will not disappear.
Logic here is Google are unlikely to simply discard highly ranked sites because they're not mobile friendly. A good test is to check the Bureau of Meteorology. The Bureau of Meteorology site is not currently mobile friendly.
2. The second school of thought is that sites that are not mobile friendly will simply vanish from Google search results when people search using their mobile phone. This is where people are being scared.
How likely really is it that Google will simply drop every major site because they're not mobile friendly. Not very likely, in fact very unlikely, but it is possible.
We've left some of our sites so they're not mobile friendly. One site gets around 15,000 visitors a month. We've also recorded a list of sites. So let's see what actually happens.
Make a note of those businesses who promote using mobilegeddon. Then you'll know who is prepared to use scare tactics if scenario 1 happens, but if scenario 2 happens, well you know they got it right.
Honestly at this point I don't know. I believe scenario 1 is most likely, but I've seen the major players do things which affect millions to hundreds of millions for their own interests, so really with scenario 2, I'd never say never, just not likely. Happy to be proved wrong, but my approach is to test so I will be testing. The knowledge gained through testing to me is the best way to support and assist clients. Not scare tactics.
Kelvin Eldridge
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
Call 0415 910 703 for IT support.
Update 22/04/15: Google Australia confirms my suspicion about with the mobile-friendly ranking signal update. This is unusual to see such a comment so it looks like their update may have been causing a lot of angst and misinformation in the marketplace. This wouldn't be good for Google when that happens.
http://google-au.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/mobilegeddon-were-going-for-mobiletopia.html
The mains points are:
1. This is a ranking signal. Being mobile friendly is just one of 200 such ranking signals. Interesting the number is stated as one of 200. Is there really exactly 200 ranking signals?
2. Sites won't just disappear and they may still rank highly. I look at it this way. Being mobile friendly is one of 200, so it still represents a small percentage even if it was given a higher influence, it would still only be part of the signal which enables a site to rank.
3. This update is just for mobile devices. Not tablets, not notebooks. This has been stated before. Although there is no reason for this not to change. I say this because this is also about Google moving the focus onto their ecosystem which means Android and the Play store. Android tablets could easily be the next target, although given the quite small market share, that may be some time off.
4. The guide for taking a day or so to fully redesign a 10-20 page website to be mobile friendly, is certainly underestimating the work and cost this change is placing on businesses. That type of misinformation doesn't help anyone.
There's two schools of thought with Google's coming update on the 21/4/15. Google has stated mobile friendly will be a ranking factor.
Now of course as per usual with Google there's a lack of information and people are using this as an opportunity to scare people into spending money, perhaps unnecessarily. There are two schools of thought.
1. The first theory is Google is simply making mobile friendly a ranking signal. This means sites that are mobile friendly will rank better and thus sites that aren't mobile friendly will rank lower. Sites in this case will not disappear.
Logic here is Google are unlikely to simply discard highly ranked sites because they're not mobile friendly. A good test is to check the Bureau of Meteorology. The Bureau of Meteorology site is not currently mobile friendly.
2. The second school of thought is that sites that are not mobile friendly will simply vanish from Google search results when people search using their mobile phone. This is where people are being scared.
How likely really is it that Google will simply drop every major site because they're not mobile friendly. Not very likely, in fact very unlikely, but it is possible.
We've left some of our sites so they're not mobile friendly. One site gets around 15,000 visitors a month. We've also recorded a list of sites. So let's see what actually happens.
Make a note of those businesses who promote using mobilegeddon. Then you'll know who is prepared to use scare tactics if scenario 1 happens, but if scenario 2 happens, well you know they got it right.
Honestly at this point I don't know. I believe scenario 1 is most likely, but I've seen the major players do things which affect millions to hundreds of millions for their own interests, so really with scenario 2, I'd never say never, just not likely. Happy to be proved wrong, but my approach is to test so I will be testing. The knowledge gained through testing to me is the best way to support and assist clients. Not scare tactics.
Kelvin Eldridge
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
Call 0415 910 703 for IT support.
Update 22/04/15: Google Australia confirms my suspicion about with the mobile-friendly ranking signal update. This is unusual to see such a comment so it looks like their update may have been causing a lot of angst and misinformation in the marketplace. This wouldn't be good for Google when that happens.
http://google-au.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/mobilegeddon-were-going-for-mobiletopia.html
The mains points are:
1. This is a ranking signal. Being mobile friendly is just one of 200 such ranking signals. Interesting the number is stated as one of 200. Is there really exactly 200 ranking signals?
2. Sites won't just disappear and they may still rank highly. I look at it this way. Being mobile friendly is one of 200, so it still represents a small percentage even if it was given a higher influence, it would still only be part of the signal which enables a site to rank.
3. This update is just for mobile devices. Not tablets, not notebooks. This has been stated before. Although there is no reason for this not to change. I say this because this is also about Google moving the focus onto their ecosystem which means Android and the Play store. Android tablets could easily be the next target, although given the quite small market share, that may be some time off.
4. The guide for taking a day or so to fully redesign a 10-20 page website to be mobile friendly, is certainly underestimating the work and cost this change is placing on businesses. That type of misinformation doesn't help anyone.
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