Mobile-first indexing: what you need to know

On Halloween 2023, Google announced that its journey to switch to mobile-first indexing was finally complete. It’s been a long journey: way back in 2016, Google started the switch from indexing the content seen by desktop website visitors to that seen by mobile users.

Contents:

But wait, is this even news?
What does mobile-first indexing mean?
How will this affect my website?
How do I know if my site meets mobile-first requirements?
Test for:
– A mobile-friendly design
– Page loading speed
– Providing the same content and structure

Google’s helped to nudge this along by using many of these requirements as ranking factors, ensuring that they became more widely adopted.

It’s also worth saying that many websites have already switched to mobile first indexing some time ago, so for those site owners this won’t feel like big news.

But the checks outlined below are worth doing if:

• You’re not sure when your website switched to mobile-first indexing
• You haven’t already checked whether it ticks the main boxes
• You know your website is responsive, but haven’t checked if the same content is served on desktop and mobile versions

With mobile-first indexing, it’s also essential that the mobile version includes all of the important content that features on a desktop version. When we use Google search, Google doesn’t crawl the internet again to find us an answer. Instead, it chooses from content which is already stored in its index – and we need to make sure that content is a full and accurate version of a page.

How will this affect my website?

Most sites have already switched to responsive design (meaning that a page will resize well to provide a good experience on mobile). If yours is in the minority of sites which hasn’t, this needs to be a top priority. Not sure if you meet the requirements? Take a look at the tools below.

How do I know if my site meets mobile-first requirements?

Whilst you can (and should!) test out your site’s user experience on a mobile phone, there are also plenty of helpful tools that can help you check everything’s working as it should. Here are a few of the key objectives to look at and how you can check your site’s performance:

1. A mobile-friendly design

At the least, you need to provide a good user experience on mobile. Many sites do this using a responsive design, which changes depending on screen size. Take a look for:

• The website resizing well to a mobile screen size – the layout shouldn’t be the same as the desktop site. Usually, different elements stack on top of each other, as if the site has been pulled into one column (which it effectively has!). This makes the site usable without visitors having to scroll left and right to see the whole page.
• Elements resizing appropriately for mobile. Particularly look at text size and any clickable elements like buttons. Can you read everything clearly without having to zoom in? Are the buttons far enough apart? A finger is less accurate than a mouse – visitors need to be able to click the button they want without inadvertently selecting something else

You can also run the URL through some tests to flag up any issues with how Google sees it:

• Google’s Mobile Friendly Test  – there are a couple more months to use this one before it’s depreciated in December 2023. You can paste in any URL and the tool will scan the page and tell you if there are any potential issues.
• Google Search Console – You’ll need a verified Google Search Console account for this – if you haven’t already got one, it’s well worth setting up. Under ‘Experience’ on the left hand side, you’ll see the Mobile Usability report. This will flag up any issues across your site as a whole. You can also paste a URL into the inspection toolbar at the top to check a particular page.

2. Page loading speed

Whilst there have been big advances in mobile networks in recent years, loading a site over a mobile network will generally still take longer than loading it on desktop over a WiFi connection. And we know that web users don’t like waiting around – this infographic from Think With Google highlights how slower load times lead to significant drops in users.

Us humans are inherently impatient – so if you can make your site load faster, you’re likely to keep more visitors on it, which increases the likelihood of conversions.

How can I test it?

• Google Lighthouse – You’ll need Google Chrome for this one. Visit the web page you’re testing, open Google dev tools (control, shift & J on a Windows laptop), click >> on the top right to open the dropdown menu, select ‘Lighthouse’ and then click ‘analyse page load’. Give it a minute or so to run a test and you’ll then be presented with some scores. For the purposes of page speed, you’re looking at the ‘performance’ tab.
• PageSpeed Insights – If you’re not a fan of Lighthouse, PageSpeed Insights gives the same report but with a more user-friendly interface. Simply input your URL and click ‘analyse’. If there’s enough real-world data, the top section will show you how the site is loading for users. Below that is the version analysed by the tool.
• GTMetrix – It’s always worth testing on different tools as you’ll often get slightly different results. GTMetrix works in a similar way to PageSpeed Insights – paste in your URL and hit ‘test your site’. You’ll be presented with an overall grade as well as some headline performance scores. If you’re looking for a quick [rule of thumb] this is enough, but if you want to go more in-depth there’s lots more information showing you how the page looks as it loads and which elements are slowing down the page load. You can register as a user for free to get more features, including selecting where to test the site from.
• Pingdom tools – as above, it’s worth running this test across a few tools. Pingdom will let you select the location to test from without registering. This helps you get an idea of how the site performs for your audience. If you’re a UK-based site, choose London. For international sites, run a few tests to cover any key locations. As before, you’ll get some headline scores as well as some information about how you can improve your site speed.

How do I check this?

Whilst some of this can be done visually – comparing the mobile and desktop versions side by side as a user – it’s much quicker and easier to use a tool to crawl through the page for you and highlight any differences.

Merkle’s Mobile-first indexing tool is a quick and easy way to do this. Once you submit your URL, it’ll run a crawl through both the mobile and desktop versions of the website. The report highlights elements such as robots.txt, word count, main title (h1), links and images on each version, so you can quickly scan through for any discrepancies.

It’s goodbye to desktop first…

Whilst moving to mobile-first indexing might not feel new, the announcement marks the end of the desktop first era. To provide great user experiences on mobile, make sure the basics are ticked, but also think about how content can be created and updated with mobile users in mind. This might mean more use of different media such as video, breaking text into shorter paragraphs and additional formatting to keep longer pieces clear to read.

If you need support adapting to mobile-first indexing – or with other aspects of SEO – get in touch to discuss how we can help: 📨 hello@heyyou.digital 📞0115 990 2779