Businesses who have had a web presence for a long time and who already use SEO in the Bay Area may not realize yet how important it is to optimize for mobile devices. Studies show that over half of consumers use their mobile devices to search for products and services, and almost half of these people made a purchase, during the six months before the study. Obviously, smartphones and other mobile devices are a large part of the market, and it is no longer optional to provide a good experience for mobile users.

There are two ways to provide a mobile option for customers and potential clients – either by optimizing your web site to be responsive, or by creating an app. The latter is a more difficult path to follow; therefore, we will discuss the former – optimizing a responsive website.

Making a web site mobile-friendly has become much easier in recent months. There is the addition of built-in responsiveness in many templates and content management systems (such as WordPress), but it is not that difficult to optimize a website without these advantages.

The first thing to do is make sure the site’s content is visible to users. The default process for non-responsive web pages is to shrink the entire page to fit the mobile screen. Obviously, this causes the text to be much too small to read. Using stylesheets to adjust this is simple, and will make a big difference.

Secondly, be sure it loads quickly. This may require offering a different site entirely for mobile users. This is why many large companies have an m.domain.com subdomain which is served to mobile devices. This, too, can be done via stylesheet. However, it is not unreasonable to have the same site on web and mobile and have both of them load quickly. If you have a video, for example, choosing to include a link rather than embed the video speeds up page load time while still giving visitors the option to watch, if they desire.

Make sure your navigation is easy to find and access. Few things will turn away a potential customer more quickly than being unable to find what they are looking for on your web site. Be sure that pertinent information is shown at the top of the page (known as “above the fold” – what users can see without scrolling). If your company does have a mobile app, offer it on the page, rather than in a pop-up ad that blocks the content for which they are looking.

Just like PC-based SEO, mobile SEO in the Bay Area is most helped by fresh, quality content. Making sure your location and contact information are prominent is also helpful. If you want your site optimized, but are not quite sure how to make it happen, feel free to call Bay Area Online Marketing – we can help!