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"Non Mobile Friendly" Google Emails / Warnings

by BLACKSOC
11 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hello!!!

We just started to hear about this and SEO is not our core (so maybe this is old news - but Google has emailed a few people we know basically telling them their sites are non-responsive or "mobile friendly" and that as a result it would do poorly in search results for searches performed from mobile devices.

What will happen to these old sites? will they be omitted from search? and how long do people have before no one will see them, since a major share of traffic now is mobile?

Did some searching, but didn't find much, hoping someone can point me towards what the "fall out" is, in regards to this Google action - any help would be appreciated!


Many thanks!

BSOC

#emails #friendly #google #mobile #non mobile friendly #warnings
  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Do you care about mobile traffic?

    Basically make the site/pages useful for your target traffic.
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  • Profile picture of the author alvinchua91
    Google did not release an official statement on how exactly sites which are non-mobile friendly will be penalized, but from the severity Google mentioned in the article, you can be pretty dang sure you'll get smacked harder (at least for mobile search results) than Panda and Penguin and Hummingbird hit. Pretty dang sure.
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    • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
      Originally Posted by alvinchua91 View Post

      Google did not release an official statement on how exactly sites which are non-mobile friendly will be penalized, but from the severity Google mentioned in the article, you can be pretty dang sure you'll get smacked harder (at least for mobile search results) than Panda and Penguin and Hummingbird hit. Pretty dang sure.
      Because they are not going to be penalized. It is going to be incorporated as a ranking factor just like title tags, links, page speed, etc.

      A site without links does not get penalized. It just probably will not rank as well.

      Nothing they have said indicates this is going to be a filter like Penguin.
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      • Profile picture of the author kindsvater
        Because they are not going to be penalized. It is going to be incorporated as a ranking factor just like title tags, links, page speed, etc.

        A site without links does not get penalized. It just probably will not rank as well.
        If your site is dropped to #20 due to a non-mobile penalty, or only ranks at #20 because it is not mobile friendly, the end result is the same. I'm less concerned about semantics and just ranking.

        Do you care about mobile traffic?
        There are not going to be too many sites where one does not care.

        At some point people are going to look back at comments like that and go - really? When wasn't every site adaptable to desktop/tablet/phone/glass/contact lens/brain implant, etc. And why wouldn't it be flexible?

        Sort of like looking back at early web comments about whether an "Under Construction" graphic was needed for new sites

        IMHO - If your site is not mobile friendly it's long-term prospects are dim. I see Google eventually merging the mobile check into the general algos such that if a site is not mobile friendly its rankings on desktops also drop.

        For many sites it is a simple enough fix. Just do it.

        .
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        • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
          Originally Posted by kindsvater View Post

          If your site is dropped to #20 due to a non-mobile penalty, or only ranks at #20 because it is not mobile friendly, the end result is the same. I'm less concerned about semantics and just ranking.
          It is a little more than just semantics. A penalty generally indicates something that cannot be overcome by other ranking factors. If your site is hit with a manual penalty or caught in the Penguin filter, you are never going to rank on page one as long as it exists.

          A ranking factor can be overcome and you can still rank well despite it. Depending on how much importance they put on the ranking factor it might be quite challenging to overcome, but it can happen.

          For example, I can have a site that loads slow and is generally not so great when it comes to onpage SEO factors, but if I attract enough good links I can still rank highly.

          If I have a site hit by a manual penalty, I can build all the links I want. It still not going to rank until I deal with the penalty.

          I get what you are saying in that a ranking drop from this will feel like a penalty to most site owners.
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  • Profile picture of the author Kalambur
    Every website on this planet should be mobile friendly.
    Google is number 1 SE in the world. It's dictating its terms.
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