Mobile searches now outnumber desktop searches significantly, with 55% of search queries on a mobile device in 2016.

SEO has always been focused on the desktop version of your site, how quick does the desktop version load, how relevant is the desktop version of the page to your search query, but this is now changing.

One of the issues with using desktop SEO to deliver mobile SEO results is mobile pages may not have the same quality of content as its desktop equivalent, but until now, a user will have been shown the mobile version based on the desktop content. This is now changing with the phased release of mobile SEO specific search results.

Here are a few recommendations from Google to help webmasters prepare as we move towards a more mobile-focused index.

• If you have a responsive site or a dynamic serving site where the primary content and markup is equivalent across mobile and desktop, you shouldn’t have to change anything.
• If you have a site configuration where the primary content and markup is different across mobile and desktop, you should consider making some changes to your site:
  • Make sure to serve structured markup for both the desktop and mobile version. Sites can verify the equivalence of their structured markup across desktop and mobile by typing the URLs of both versions into the Structured Data Testing Tool and comparing the output. When adding structured data to a mobile site, avoid adding large amounts of markup that isn?t relevant to the specific information content of each document.
  • Use the robots.txt testing tool to verify that your mobile version is accessible to Googlebot.
  • Sites do not have to make changes to their canonical links; we’ll continue to use these links as guides to serve the appropriate results to a user searching on desktop or mobile.
• If you are a site owner who has only verified their desktop site in Search Console, please add and verify your mobile version.
• If you only have a desktop site, we’ll continue to index your desktop site just fine, even if we’re using a mobile user agent to view your site. If you are building a mobile version of your site, keep in mind that a functional desktop-oriented site can be better than a broken or incomplete mobile version of the site. It’s better for you to build up your mobile site and launch it when ready.

Read the full blog post here.

There are lots of opportunities for businesses that are prepared for the new mobile-focused SEO results. With 55% of search queries on mobile, and most business still having their primary SEO focus on desktop, making these changes now can help you get a head start on the competition. 

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