Mobile search ranking factors

MOBILE SEARCH RANKING FACTORS

Data-driven Mobile SEO for 2012

Bryson MeunierDirector, Content SolutionsResolution Media@brysonmeunier+Bryson Meunier

• Differences in smartphone ranking

• Differences in mobile search engagement: “A drop from first to fourth position on mobile phone can mean a CTR drop off of more than 90%.” Google, Winning the Zero Moment of Truth

• Mobile Search Traffic to eclipse desktop search traffic in years, not decades

MOBILE SEARCH OPTIMIZATION CRITICAL

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MANY PATHS TO MOBILE OPTIMIZATION

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One URL

Mobile URL

Mobile Site?

Site that works well

on all devices?

Smartphone optimized?

Feature phone

optimized?

Tablet optimized?

Same Content and Keywords?

Mobile Content and Keywords?

APPARENT DISAGREEMENTS WITHIN GOOGLE

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Matt Cutts recommends mobile URLs and says mobile sites don’t cause canonicalization issues in Februray 2011

Google Webmaster Team selects responsive design for “maintainability” in May 2012 blog post

• “Google recommends webmasters follow the industry best practice of using responsive web design, namely serving the same HTML for all devices and using only CSS media queries to decide the rendering on each device.”

• “If responsive design is not the best option to serve your users, Google supports serving your content using different HTML. The different HTML can be on the same URL (a setup called dynamic serving) or on different URLs, and Googlebot can handle both setups appropriately if you follow our setup recommendations.”

GOOGLE GIVES OFFICIAL RECOMMENDATION!

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Full details at https://developers.google.com/webmasters/smartphone-sites/

Mobile Search Queries

Smartphone Search Results

Mobile Search

Strategies of Top Sites

DATA TO THE RESCUE

7Download the white paper at resolutionmedia.com/white-papers/rank-higher-in-google-mobile-search

“Use 100% valid XHTML 1.0 code. […] Many optimizers on the traditional WWW do not consider using valid code as a best practice. Mobile search engines however may have more trouble digesting invalid code.”-Andy Hagans, (circa 2005) MobileSearchMarketing.com (#4 in Google for “mobile SEO”)

TRUE OR FALSE?: VALIDATION IS KEY

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FALSEDownload the white paper at resolutionmedia.com/white-papers/rank-higher-in-google-mobile-search

“MOBILE SEO RULE NUMBER ONE: if you're trying to attract a mobile audience, then you'd better be good at it and you'd better give them an elegant user experience!-DotMobi (circa 2008), Mobithinking.com (#1 in Google for “mobile SEO”)

“Getting from needs to actions lightning fast is especially important on smaller devices like mobile phones, where screen size is limited and context really matters.”Larry Page, Google CEO in 2012 Letter to Investors

TRUE OR FALSE?: MOBILE USABILITY/PAGE SPEED IS HELPFUL

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FALSEDownload the white paper at resolutionmedia.com/white-papers/rank-higher-in-google-mobile-search

“But right now, partly because of the relative lack of competition and partly because as I explained above, the link graph makes less sense for mobile sites and users, links are not needed for (at least some) mobile rankings.-Will Critchlow (circa 2008), SEOMoz.org

TRUE OR FALSE?: LINKBUILDING IS UNNECESSARY

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FALSEDownload the white paper at resolutionmedia.com/white-papers/rank-higher-in-google-mobile-search

“The best way to build your mobile web site for SEO is by using the dotMobi domain”-DotMobi (circa 2008), Mobithinking.com (#1 in Google for “mobile SEO”)

TRUE OR FALSE?: DOTMOBI HELPS

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FALSEDownload the white paper at resolutionmedia.com/white-papers/rank-higher-in-google-mobile-search

“The best Mobile SEO strategy is to not have a mobile SEO strategy.”-Ryan Jones (circa 2011), SearchEngineJournal.com (#3 in Google for “mobile SEO”)

“Having a mobile site is strongly correlated with top three rankings in Google smartphone search”-Bryson Meunier (circa 2012), SearchEngineLand.com

TRUE OR FALSE?: MOBILE SITES HELP RANKING

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TRUEDownload the white paper at resolutionmedia.com/white-papers/rank-higher-in-google-mobile-search

30 MOBILE SEARCH RANKING FACTORS

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• Presence of content that matches mobile searcher's query

1 – VERY IMPORTANT

14

Fina

nce • 77% of total

search volume for [atm] and 99% of volume from [atm locations] comes from mobile devices D

inin

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d N

ight

life • 88% of

searches for [restaurants], 97% of searches for [bars] and 80% of searches for [restaurants near me] come from mobile devices

Inte

rnet

& T

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• 69% of [apps for android] and 73% of [download ringtones] searches come from mobile devices

• Proximity of business location to searcher device location• Presence of Google+ Local listing

1 – VERY IMPORTANT

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• 10 Web listings on desktop for [restaurants]

• 3 Web listings from Restaurant icon on mobile browser homepage

• Listing properly redirected to or reformatted for Googlebot mobile or smartphone Googlebot

1 – VERY IMPORTANT

16

• Mobile site blocked by robots.txt (negative)

2 – IMPORTANT

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• Presence of mobile site (responsive or dedicated)

• Presence of mobile site in feature phone index

2 – IMPORTANT

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• Mobile sitemap exists (primarily important for feature phone users)

3 – MODERATELY IMPORTANT

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• Logo indexed and appearing first for Google image search

• Product label indexed and appearing first for Google image search product query

4 – OF LIMITED IMPORTANCE FOR MOBILE SEARCH

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• Presence of mobile app(s) in Google Play

• Presence of mobile app(s) in iTunes

• Use of keyword in app name

4 – OF LIMITED IMPORTANCE FOR MOBILE SEARCH

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5

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8

9

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23

4

5

6

7

8

9Incognito laptop results for [chat app]

Signed out iPhone 4 results for [chat app]

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• Use of "mobile" somewhere in title tag

4 – OF LIMITED IMPORTANCE FOR MOBILE SEARCH

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• Aggregate data from Google reader indicating which content is viewed most often from mobile devices

• Presence of keyword rich content in carrier store

• Use of "mobile" somewhere on page

• Use of m. subdomain for listed site

• Use of same domain for desktop and mobile sites

• Use of Metatxt standard

5 – UNPROVEN RANKING FACTORS

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• Accessibility of site to multiple devices

• Percent of navigational search volume with word "mobile" following

• Percentage of navigational searches from mobile devices relative to whole

• Presence of link to desktop site in footer

• Use of mobile TLD (dotMobi)• Valid code

6 – HELPFUL FOR MOBILE MARKETING, NOT MOBILE SEARCH

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• Links from mobile social networks

• Mobile Link Popularity: Quantity of quality links from mobile sites

• Percentage of links that are from mobile sites

• Visits from QR code scans

7 – EMERGING TRENDS BUT NOT CURRENTLY A FACTOR

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1. Understand the differences between what your mobile user expects and what your desktop user expects and build your mobile site accordingly

2. Build a mobile home page at m.domain.com that addresses the mobile user’s goals with link to full site and responsive duplicate pages OR build a mobile first responsive design driven site if goals are same.

3. Do not block your mobile URLs with robots.txt. Use canonical tags for duplicate URLs and redirect smartphone URLs to smartphone Googlebot but make mobile homepage unique to appear for mobile navigational searches (i.e. [brand + “mobile site”])

4. Market your mobile site externally in print and broadcast advertising and online. Links, authority and social shares still matter in mobile.

5. Don’t believe everything you read. Many consultants are applying traditional SEO best practices to mobile, which doesn’t always translate. Trust but verify.

DATA-DRIVEN MOBILE SEO BEST PRACTICES

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For 25 more visit brysonmeunier.com/mobile-seo-best-practices

Bryson MeunierDirector, Content SolutionsResolution Mediabmeunier@resolutionmedia.comhttp://www.brysonmeunier.comhttp://www.resolutionmedia.com@brysonmeunier

THANK YOU!

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