Search Engine Watch announces the Google Mobile First Search
Google is moving to Mobile First Search but how will that really impact your real estate website?
There is a great article here at SearchEngineWatch about the new Google Mobile First search changes.
What the article explains is that Google will basically split out into two different search engines; one for desktop and another for mobile. The mobile version will be updated most and be their flagship.
Why is Mobile First Search happening?
Mobile search has become as much as 80% of search traffic. With all of the wonderful smart phones people can search anything, anywhere, anytime. Just last night before I went to bed, I was reading a book that mentioned going into an old house with a lot of bedrooms. The images of Hanover PA, a beautiful town with a bunch of incredible old homes, passed through my mind.
I grabbed my iPhone and googled "Hanover PA real estate". The first non-ZTR-ish site I found was a REMAX office. I did a search and saw that there were many of the beautiful homes for sale that I admired on my trip. I didn't buy anything, but I did quickly do a search and spend a few minutes satisfying my curiousity.
How will this impact my WordPress or other real estate website?
This may or may not really impact your website. Take a look at this chart from an actual client site today:
You can see that almost 70% of their traffic and almost 88% of their goals come from desktop.
This means that although they get visits from mobile. Most of their activity and leads come from desktop.
If google does a mobile first strategy, it probably won't have a huge impact on this client's site. They do get alot of their traffic from Google, but the conversions are coming from referrals.
So, even if Google is a huge part of the traffic on the site, referrals from other sites, emails, links and other sources are bringing most of their leads.
What should I do?
First: DON'T PANIC
I see so many times that Google makes a shift and we start getting tons of calls from real estate agents who ask if their site is SSL or ADA compliant as soon as they go to a conference or continuing education class.
Look at your site.
Is it mobile responsive? It better be. It should have been for about 5 years. :)
Check it on Google Insights: https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/ . This will show you what Google thinks of your site. Does it look good? It doesn't have to be 100% on all counts. Compare your site to Realtor.com, Zillow and Trulia. How do you match up? I recommend at least 70% on desktop and on mobile.
Check it on mobile devices. Does your IDX work well on your iPhone or tablet? That is good.
Keep calm, keep working, keep blogging. If everything looks good, just take it in stride. If you see that you are in trouble with your site, contact us and we will be happy to make a recommendation.
At http://realtycandy.com, we have a contact form you can fill out in less than 60 seconds.
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