Everyone knows that having a mobile friendly site is essential for serving customers today. With a growing percentage of people using their mobile devices for the majority of their browsing, it really just makes good sense to put in the time and effort necessary to optimize your site with these customers in mind. Google has just announced an update, however, that will make this even more important.
The “Mobile Friendly” label, which has been in testing for quite some time, has now officially announced that they are rolling it out over the coming weeks. This label will be placed in the search results, just under the site URL, for many pages that Google has confirmed as mobile friendly. When people are browsing search results on their phones or tablets, they will be able to quickly see that a site will load properly on their device, so they will be more likely to tap on it.
Sites that are mobile ready should automatically get this tag as the GoogleBot crawls their pages. To meet the requirements to get the label, you need to ensure your site can pass the following points:
- Places links far enough apart so that the correct one can easily be tapped
- Uses text that is easily readable without having to zoom in
- Avoids any software or code that is not typically available on mobile devices (flash)
- Sizes the content on the screen so that it fits properly without having to hold the device horizontally or zoom in
Most modern mobile themes and skins will make it quick and easy to meet these requirements. If your site is not already in compliance, make sure you are taking the necessary steps to be considered mobile friendly as quickly as possible or you may begin to notice a steep decline in mobile traffic. You can read more about this label HERE on Google’s announcement post.
