Although you may not think it, search engine optimization (SEO) is like fishing. To catch a fish, you need to attract the fish. It may sound simple but think of your website. If your website doesn’t attract your target market, then you’re actually doing things wrong. The first thing that you need to do is to study the market. The same thing that any fisherman would do: study the nature of the fish and adapt to it. For one, you need to know where your market is and choose the right bait.
At the time of the virus, SEO should mean being mobile-friendly. That may raise an eyebrow from you. Truth be told, however, the market has been increasingly dependent on mobile devices while slowly leaving desktops. In the year 2020 alone, when the virus spread chaos in America, mobile devices reigned supreme. Studies show websites were accessed from mobile devices 64% of the time based on 5 trillion visits for that year. It’s definitely more than the 36% share for desktops.
The good news is a mobile-friendly SEO strategy for you isn’t actually an impossible dream. Many have benefited from it. Even better, there are tried-and-tested methodologies to get you there. Here’s a list of the essential things you need to pay attention to, all from the experts.
Design to Your Client’s Needs
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It’s easy to be confused about how to approach your website design. Will it be you cater to the aesthetics? Or should it be functional first and foremost? Well, the mobile experience, as different an experience as it is to shop in a physical store, shares some similarities with the brick-and-mortar experience. And the question you need to ask yourself is what makes you stay for longer in a traditional shop?
Well, so long as your curiosity is piqued, you’re bound to stay in that shop. Small wonder stores use all sorts of tricks (e.g., mirrors) to make their shop as attractive as can be.
As for your website, your design should be pleasing to your target market’s eyes. That means not only is it functional but also catchy. It’s essential, therefore, that you outline the following in your website to make it mobile-friendly:
- Nature of the business
- User type
- Study on the devices most likely to visit your site
In short, your website should be your best foot forward. The user experience must be a blast, filled with information but seamless.
Attend to Your Page Speed
As you notice above, the nature of your business is key. A website of a business catering directly to consumers (B2C) will have a different set of needs compared to businesses catering to other businesses (B2B). In this regard, getting B2B digital marketing experts is wise if you want to appeal to your customers, who are mainly other establishments and not the American consumer as a whole. As you appeal to a more professional market, you will need more focused expertise.
The reason why you need to optimize for mobile phones is to boost your business. Be careful, though. Studies show even one second of delay in the loading speed of your website can mean a 7% reduction of your site’s conversions. If that’s the case, you need to step up. These are the key areas that could improve better page loading speeds:
- Set Benchmarks
Calculate your site’s average loading speed by using the right tool (Pingdom/Google PageSpeed Insight). Once known, set your sights at a better target: 3 seconds loading speeds or even shorter.
2. Choose the Right Web Host
Don’t underestimate your web hosting. Hands down, it’s the most essential factor when gunning for speed. No matter how much you improve your SEO, if your web host is slow, you’re pretty limited.
3. Boost Site Architecture
This is where Google parameters come in. On-page optimization must be factored in to allow Google bot crawlers to go through your page and rank it well.
Make the Most of Mobile-first Indexing
There are many ways Google ranks pages. The slew of updates it made (Penguin, Panda) can certainly leave your head swirling. But what’s important to remember is that Google these days based its ranking of a site from a mobile POV. So, it may not matter if you’ve mobile-optimized your site. It’s paramount you focus on what kind of content you are creating for your client in your mobile version. Such content should be seamless to navigate, giving your client greater satisfaction.
Content is king. Even when you have a great website, but if your content is lousy, your customers are bound to be disappointed. Again, it all goes back to quality service.
Best Tools Matter
In your quest to get the job done, know that the right tools can spell a huge difference in ensuring stunning results. By making the most of these tools, you can check on the progress of your mobile SEO optimization endeavor. Over time, some essentials tools to help you achieve that mobile-friendly website are:
1. Google Test My Site
Run this tool from Google, and you’ll see the nitty-gritty of your mobile website. Top of the list is your mobile loading speed.
2. Mobile-friendly Test
It’s a vital tool to know how mobile-friendly your site is. You get to either pass or fail. Running it should be an eye-opener, one that gets you closer to your goal.
SEO can help many businesses, but you need to make it suitable for all platforms so your market could see you whatever platform they use.