Google is in the process of rolling out several new rank changes to give preference to mobile friendly websites, meaning websites that are not optimised for mobile viewing will probably be penalised.
This has been coming for a few months as Google stated a few months back that it favours responsive web design as it removes the duplicate content issues that came with mobile specific website design.
If you’re not sure what a responsive website is, take a look at this animation all about them.
Google also provided some new tools in analytics a while back to help you make your website work better on mobile devices, which incidentally now equate to over 50% of all web pages viewed!
Finally, Google is rolling out a new text indicator that appears next to listings in the search engine results pages to tell the user if the website is mobile complaint. It currently looks like the below, but this may change. I noticed previously they were using an icon, but it appears they have opted for text instead.
Usually, when Google says it likes something or gives you tools to make something work better, it’s only a matter of time before your site loses its ranking if you are not compliant.
This time, Google has done both and we are not the only SEO agency that thinks that this is coming, the community is awash with discussions about when Google will really start to penalise non-mobile friendly websites. Only time will tell…
