It has been months since Google’s mobile friendly update and some websites are still feeling the impact of Mobilegeddon. Back in April, Google rolled out its Mobile Friendly Algorithm. This algorithm penalized non-mobile friendly sites from Google’s search results, and many sites are still trying to recover. If months later you are still feeling the impact of the update, it is definitely time to take action. Here are a few tips on how to get your site back on track if you got hit with a penalty.
Run Diagnostics
You should start by looking at the overall traffic of your site to see if you were hit with a penalty. Run diagnostics and if your traffic slowed way down at the end of April you most likely were affected. One way to determine traffic changes due to algorithm updates is to use the Panguin tool by Barracuda Digital, which allows you to view a year of traffic data compared to a timeline of all the Google algorithm updates.
Compare Traffic
Compare your site’s mobile traffic with desktop traffic. You can review this data in Google Analytics by navigating to Mobile and then Overview. Here you will see a breakdown of where user’s traffic is coming from, desktop, mobile, and tablet. If you have a high percentage of mobile traffic it is even more critical to fix any mobile usability problems you are having.
Analyze Individual Pages
Unlike many of Google’s previous updates, the Mobile Friendly update only affected individual pages in SERP’s, not the entire website. For this reason, it is important to analyze individual pages and not just look at site-wide date. Only specific pages that were not optimized for mobile sites were affected. Use Google’s Mobile Friendly Test to check the pages on your site to make sure they are all mobile friendly. You can then use the Google Search Console to view mobile usability of each individual page. You can also go as far as finding out which pages have errors and what those errors are.
Make Changes
If pages on your site do have mobile usability errors, make the changes necessary to fix them. Once you have the data it is important to make the repairs to fix the problem.With this update, Google tells you exactly the pages that were affected, why they were affected and what to do about them. If it is only a few pages that have errors it could be a simple fix in the CMS. But, if most pages on your site have errors it could be a site-wide issue that may require a complete overhaul.
If you are still feeling the effects of mobilegeddon it is important you take action to bring your site up to par with Googles Mobile Friendly Algorithm update. Contact Boston Web Marketing with any questions regarding Google’s Mobile Friendly Update.