Google penalizing non-mobile sites

Banned 9 years ago

The cleanest way to manage this is use responsive webpages. That covers both desktop & mobile traffic.

There's no easy way with existing ranked pages, messing with ranked pages is always going to be touchy.

Thanks
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LoclBiz

9 years ago

Originally Posted by yukon

The cleanest way to manage this is use responsive webpages. That covers desktop & mobile traffic.

There's no easy way with existing ranked pages, messing with ranked pages is always going to be touchy.

You're absolutely right. I should have made my website responsive from the beginning. And it seems as if I am going to suffer because of my mistake.

Since my website is already ranking (relatively) well, changing it now wouldn't be in my best interest, correct? Am I correct in assuming that making a secondary mobile friendly website to redirect smartphone users to is the best option?

I have looked at competitor's websites, some of them use DudaMobile. When going to their website on a computer or tablet, you get the normal website. But when you go to it on a smartphone, you get redirected to a secondary mobile friendly website. I looked it up on Google's mobile friendly tester and they all come up good.

The only thing is that I would rather host the secondary website myself instead of rely on them for a monthly fee.

Thanks
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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

You're absolutely right. I should have made my website responsive from the beginning. And it seems as if I am going to suffer because of my mistake.

Since my website is already ranking (relatively) well, changing it now wouldn't be in my best interest, correct? Am I correct in assuming that making a secondary mobile friendly website to redirect smartphone users to is the best option?

I have looked at competitor's websites, some of them use DudaMobile. When going to their website on a computer or tablet, you get the normal website. But when you go to it on a smartphone, you get redirected to a secondary mobile friendly website. I looked it up on Google's mobile friendly tester and they all come up good.

The only thing is that I would rather host the secondary website myself instead of rely on them for a monthly fee.

I'm 99.99% sure If you use some canned mobile conversion for the masses tool, it will ruin ranked SERP positions.

The reason I say that is, a canned mobile tool doesn't care about your existing internal link structure (site nav. links, etc...) which is what helps rank pages.

Hand coding & small scale testing is the best solution. Start with longtail keywords that are easy to rank & work backwards towards your most important keywords to see how Google handles the new responsive webpages.

Thanks
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LoclBiz

9 years ago

Originally Posted by yukon

I'm 99.99% sure If you use some canned mobile conversion for the masses tool, it will ruin ranked SERP positions.

The reason I say that is, a canned mobile tool doesn't care about your existing internal link structure (site nav. links, etc...) which is what helps rank pages.

Gotcha.

But that would only ruin the mobile rankings, correct? It wouldn't effect my normal website rankings? Or would it?

If it only hurts my mobile rankings, then I would have to figure out which is the greater evil, the "canned mobile tool" or the Google penalty for not having a mobile friendly site.

I appreciate your help with this.

Thanks
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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

Gotcha.

But that would only ruin the mobile rankings, correct? It wouldn't effect my normal website rankings? Or would it?

If it only hurts my mobile rankings, then I would have to figure out which is the greater evil, the "canned mobile tool" or the Google penalty for not having a mobile friendly site.

I appreciate your help with this.

What are you running on your site, Wordpress or plain HTML pages?

Thanks
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LoclBiz

9 years ago

Originally Posted by yukon

What are you running on your site, Wordpress or plain HTML pages?

Plain HTML.

Thanks
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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

Plain HTML.

Your in luck BIG time.

You can do what I said earlier without any CMS hassles (Wordpress).

You can start with a longtail keyword/page where your ranking 1st page for the keyword, make the single webpage responsive & see how both Google desktop & mobile SERPs react to your responsive page.

Once you get a few longtail pages tweaked the way you want & Google SERPs is all happy, then slowly start working backwards towards your most important keywords & converting those pages to responsive pages with the same header/sidebar/footer site nav/links as the 1st few longtail pages you proved worked fine in the SERPs for both desktop & mobile SERPs.

The key to a good switch over is trying to keep your old site/link structure intact for SEO which shouldn't be a big deal since your working with plain old simple HTML.

I guess you don't have any complex javascript or Flash going on with the old webpages.

Thanks
1 reply

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LoclBiz

9 years ago

Originally Posted by yukon

Your in luck BIG time.

You can do what I said earlier without any CMS hassles (Wordpress).

You can start with a longtail keyword/page where your ranking 1st page for the keyword, make the single webpage responsive & see how both Google desktop & mobile SERPs react to your responsive page.

Once you get a few longtail pages tweaked the way you want & Google SERPs is all happy, then slowly start working backwards towards your most important keywords & converting those pages to responsive pages with the same header/sidebar/footer site nav/links as the 1st few longtail pages you proved worked fine in the SERPs for both desktop & mobile SERPs.

The key to a good switch over is trying to keep your old site/link structure intact for SEO which shouldn't be a big deal since your working with plain old simple HTML.

I guess you don't have any complex javascript or Flash going on with the old webpages.

Nope, no Flash, just some simple javascripts for contact forms.

I'm still trying to digest what you recommend me doing (I'm at the bottom beginner level

).

Thanks
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paulgl 9 years ago

You could simply make it more mobile friendly.

I had already done that on all my websites.

That is, doing what google said, like increasing text slightly,
shrinking overall site width to less than 700, etc.

I would like to add that on a "mobile" site, and I use that term
loosely, a contact form is a moot point.

So, make your telephone number clickable. That's what people will
do using a smartphone.

Example, <a href="tel:18001231234">1-800-123-1234</a>

It does not matter if it shows up on a desktop. In fact, you can
add text to the link part like:
<a href="tel:18001231234">Click to dial us from your smartphone: 1-800-123-1234</a>

I presume many people did not know that.

That phone tip is golden, actually. Okay, I think that iphone will make a phone number
clickable anyway, if they can detect it, so will android in some cases. More people
use android.

The thing is, how many people know that you can click a phone number? That's
why I like to tip them off.

You can also change the link to use skype. Just google it, but you want it to
dial your bus phone, not your skype.

Paul
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- LoclBiz 9 years ago
  
  Thanks for all the tips Paul.
  
  Many of the existing design elements of my website are wider than 700 pixels, which is why I think the site may need a major overhaul in order to get it mobile friendly. This is probably way above my head, I need a professional for this to do like Yukon said.
  
  I agree that the email contact box isn't necessary on a mobile site. I do try to focus my potential customers on my phone number and it is clickable like you mentioned.
  
  Thanks
  
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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

Nope, no Flash, just some simple javascripts for contact forms.

I'm still trying to digest what you recommend me doing (I'm at the bottom beginner level

).

If you don't know HTML you'll either have to hire someone or learn HTML.

Personally If I was overhauling a site I would use a responsive framework like Getskeleton (free). It includes a few media queries in the CSS to help with different screen sizes. Download & mess around with the files offline.

Once you wrap your head around responsive web design (HTML & CSS) it's not really that complicated. Here's a tutorial for building responsive HTML pages with Getskeleton, it's a simple page but covers most of the basics.

Build a Responsive, Mobile-Friendly Web Page With Skeleton

[ 1 ] Thanks
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LoclBiz

9 years ago

I made my website but I can't really say that I know HTML. I pretty much reverse engineered things that I liked from other sites and then tweaked things, learning what to do one step at a time. I ended up making a nice site that took me years

Lol. I should have just paid someone

I'm going to look into skeleton and see what I can do, thanks.

Thanks
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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

I made my website but I can't really say that I know HTML. I pretty much reverse engineered things that I liked from other sites and then tweaked things, learning what to do one step at a time. I ended up making a nice site that took me years

Lol. I should have just paid someone

I'm going to look into skeleton and see what I can do, thanks.

That's the easiest way to learn HTML/CSS, copy code snippets from other websites (view source code in browser) & customize to fit your own pages. It's just like anything else, learn from doing.

[edit]
One thing I forgot to mention about that tutorial link I posted earlier, the tutorial is using an older version of the skeleton framework where they have 16 columns wide on the webpage, the new version is 12 columns wide (no big deal), just something to pay attention to If you try the tutorial.

Here's another skeleton tutorial, skip the Photoshop stuff If needed.

Thanks

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nmwf

9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

Gotcha.

But that would only ruin the mobile rankings, correct? It wouldn't effect my normal website rankings?

This new Google requirement affects mobile search only. It won't touch desktop or tablet searches.

From the horse's mouth: "This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results. "

Source: Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Finding more mobile-friendly search results

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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by nmwf

This new Google requirement affects mobile search only. It won't touch desktop or tablet searches.

From the horse's mouth: "This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results. "

Source: Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Finding more mobile-friendly search results

That doesn't say a word about tablets.

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nmwf 9 years ago

Originally Posted by yukon

That doesn't say a word about tablets.

I was rather surprised to find this out myself, but it's out there:

https://www.seroundtable.com/google-...nly-20094.html
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- yukon Banned 9 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by nmwf
  
  I was rather surprised to find this out myself, but it's out there:
  
  https://www.seroundtable.com/google-...nly-20094.html
  
  Yea, I know about that blog post.
  
  The funny part about that blog post is they say you won't see a mobile icon for their own site on a tablet. When I search their example keyword with my phone (search engine roundtable) I don't see a mobile icon on the SERPs for their domain/pages, even If I switch to Classic View for Google SERPs on my phone. The mobile icon shows for their social profiles (Twitter, etc...) when searching the same keyword, but not their actual site.
  
  I know this, their site (hxxps://www.seroundtable.com) isn't responsive pages.
  
  Their example isn't exactly an example.
  
  Thanks
  
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paulgl 9 years ago

Originally Posted by nmwf

This new Google requirement affects mobile search only. It won't touch desktop or tablet searches.

Tablets are considered mobile devices.

Paul
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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

OP, something I should have mentioned earlier, the Google Cache (text version) will show you everything you need to keep Google happy (new page vs old page). That's a plain text version of your webpage & what Google is crawling (text + links).

Create your responsive HTML pages offline & then use this browser plugin (link below) to simulate a Google Cache (text version) webpage. The plugin isn't perfect but it's a very close simulation (best I've found).

Download this web/dev Firefox plugin, use the 3 plugin settings below to simulate a Google Cache (text version).

Disable all javascript
Disable all images
Disable all styles

Here's an example of a Google cache (text version) of this forum thread page, just an example so you know what to look for when working on your own site/pages.

Thanks
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LoclBiz

9 years ago

So you are saying to make the text version of the new page as close as possible to the text version of the existing page?

Thanks
1 reply

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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

So you are saying to make the text version of the new page as close as possible to the text version of the existing page?

Yea, make them as close as possible on the text version of the webpage (on-page text + links). Those are the on-page things Google used to rank your existing pages.

The visual side of the live webpage isn't important (theme/template images, colors, etc...).

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LoclBiz

9 years ago

I see now.

Going off of what you said, I wonder if I could leave all the text and links alone and just change around some of the longer images/navbars and play with the CSS in order to make it responsive enough to be mobile friendly.

Thanks
1 reply

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yukon

Banned 9 years ago

Originally Posted by LoclBiz

I see now.

Going off of what you said, I wonder if I could leave all the text and links alone and just change around some of the longer images/navbars and play with the CSS in order to make it responsive enough to be mobile friendly.

Try it on a few of the longtail keywords/pages that are less important & see how it works out in the SERPs. I would give it a few weeks of waiting/watching to see how the SERPs respond.

The latest SEO paranoia date is April 21st, maybe make the changes on a few test pages now & wait a couple of weeks after the doomsday date.

Like I said in the other forum thread, I'm sure Google is already using the new mobile algo. today.

Thanks
1 reply

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LoclBiz 9 years ago

I could try it on some of my city landing pages that I don't get many calls from.

Currently all the pages use the same header, sidebar, and footer. So if I could find a responsive design that works I could just make the change on all of them. That would be easy.
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cothien

9 years ago

Thank all new infomation about mobile searchs....

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karishmasingla

9 years ago

No, Google can't ban non mobile friendly website. Google can give additional advantages to Mobile responsive website.

on 21st April you will some updates from the Google regarding mobile friendly website.

Here you can read for more information: Mobile Optimization - Blog/

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larrypaul

9 years ago

Google penalizing non mobile site, due to latest algorithm in which it suggest all websites to be mobile friendly. As 80% of users this days are browsing websites through mobile data only and is the latest update of google.

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nettiapina

9 years ago

Some really good stuff in this thread.

I'd just like to point out one thing: unless your page has a very rigid table-based layout or something like that responsive design should be well within your reach. You're overriding the "default" desktop settings for the smaller screen sizes. No matter what the coding style you should be able to "shout" over the "defaults".

Just have the mobile CSS as the last CSS file, and if you don't succeed with normal CSS remember the !important attribute. That helps even if you've got style code inline in the HTML.

Secondary mobile site is an option that Google also recognizes, but as Yukon pointed out it's not that easy.

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fernando25

9 years ago

So why not doing a new site, making it responsive and use the moment to get a better ranking?

Sure a canned responsive site won't do it but if you have done the first site yourself do the second with mobile friendly site with SEO friendly structures.

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nettiapina 9 years ago

Originally Posted by fernando25

So why not doing a new site, making it responsive and use the moment to get a better ranking?

That's an investment. Either you're using your time and resources, or paying someone else. Probably takes anywhere from week to two months to get it done.

If you can start such a project right away there's something wrong with the way you do business. Most developers worth their salt aren't able to start right away, because they've got a project going on.

How is this a sensible suggestion in a thread about Google's upcoming change on 21th of this month?
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Links in signature will not help your SEO. Not on this site, and not on any other forum.
Who told me this? An ex Google web spam engineer.

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KylieSweet

9 years ago

If Google find your site not mobile friendly it will not penalize your website or decrease your site's position in search results.

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Google penalizing non-mobile sites

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