Google's mobile-first indexing

In our opinion, the best part of doing business on the internet are the innovations. Responding to changes and anticipating all developments is of course a thrill. This is of course a pleasant thought for iMedia Bureau customers. We are therefore completely ready for Google's Mobile First. Sites built by us, B2B or via ecommerce, are mobile ready. But what about you? Has your site been completely checked and approved or are you still in the danger zone? And what exactly does Google Mobile First actually mean? You are of course always welcome at iMedia Bureau for a simple explanation, useful tips and good solutions for your online presence. We answer the question: What is mobile first and how do I deal with it?

The mobile-first indexing by Google search engines, which has been announced since 2015, has started. With this mobile first, a reshuffling of search engine results could easily happen. With this system, Google prefers mobile friendly sites with a low loading time. Moreover, the real and therefore complete mobile sites also have an advantage. Now of course every webmaster or owner of a website hopes for a high or higher place in the search results. The higher the ranking, the more visitors your site has. Because of those many visitors, your site automatically scores better in the search engines and you are therefore in a positive vicious circle. And of course we all know what that means. Or not quite?

What do your numbers say? 

Of course, you don't have to be a professor to recognize the fairness and necessity of mobile first and respond to it. At iMedia Bureau we have been building mobile-ready sites for years and we also maintain and optimize the SER for many customers. We are ready for the changes. But what do your numbers say? Do you regularly check your statistics via Google Analytics or on the server? Then of course you know exactly the percentage of telephone vs. desktop of your visitors. Have you also noticed an increasing number of visitors via mobile devices or are your visitors still desk bound? How do you deal with the numbers and are you ready for mobile first?

SEO: how the Googlebot does its work 

To understand what exactly the changes from mobile first are, you need to be aware of how search engines determine who is first. Especially how they do that plays a role here.
The recent changes are not major, but they are effective. Are you perfectly informed about the method and operation of crawlbots and the technical aspects of search engine indexation? Then you can simply skip these next paragraphs and scroll through to the consequences or even straight to our tips for a better online top position with mobile first.

Visitors from California 

Do you want to refresh your memory or just know how it works? To determine its position in the search engines, your site is regularly visited by robots, the so-called web crawlers. You can also easily find this in the statistics yourself. Do you wonder where the regular interest from California in your website comes from? Those are precisely Google's search robots. These bots regularly visit all websites (trillions of sites worldwide) and pay attention to things such as updates, site index and structure, content, keywords, relevance and loading time. After all data has been indexed in their database, mobile visibility is also checked and counts in the assessment.

But what actually changes? 

With the introduction of mobile first, the method of indexing your site does not change, but the order in which it is assessed. Where your website ultimately appears on search results is now first and foremost determined by the mobile version of your website. Only once it has been fully investigated for updates, loading time, etc., will the 'regular' desktop version of your site be taken into consideration. Are you ready for these changes or do you doubt them? Not bad at all, because SEO and SER are of course a specialization. That is why we would like to tell you, B2B but in normal words, what is going on with the launch of Mobile First. Do you want to know what the consequences are for your (online) business? What can you expect and how fast do you have to be?

What is the impact of mobile first in the Netherlands? 

With the new rules, good and complete mobile (friendly) sites are given preference over others in the search engines. Even if the content is identical. Is your mobile site a smaller version of your website and have you left out parts (for convenience or because of the long loading time)? Then that could be detrimental to your position and ranking. On the other hand, if your mobile version contains all the information people are looking for, it can be an advantage. Are you still following all this? Great, because then you can probably monitor the consequences of mobile first on your ranking very well.

Tips from the SEO expert 

Of course, we would also like to give you some tips on how you can score with mobile first. First of all, you can have your site analyzed by Google itself. A handy tool to check your homepage and your most important pages can be found at: https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly
If you get the conclusion: 'Page is suitable for mobile devices' then you are off to a good start. Do you see the message: 'Page partially loaded'? By clicking further you can see what Google thinks is wrong with your site.

Check loading time yourself 

Also an important point of attention for yourself, your customers and Google is the (mobile) loading time of your site. This has always been a point of attention for iMedia Bureau, because in various tests the long loading time came in second as the 'biggest irritation when visiting a web page'. You can check the loading time of your landing page and other pages of your site for free via: https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?hl=nl 

Last but not least 

Are you having a little trouble interpreting all the numbers? Then you can email us your questions. Would you rather take action right away or want a real boost to your mobile online presence? Then make one quickly Appointment for a top position with mobile first.