Google has an array of tools available to make your site more mobile-friendly. Image source: Mobile Mixed

On April 21 of this year, Google will install a new algorithm — every website owner and SEO manager NEEDS to know about it. Google’s updates are generally unnoticeable to site owners who follow the rules. As we observed in from Penguin and Panda, their algorithms are being continuously altered to read search rankings on a more semantic basis. Which if you think about it, makes logical sense why Google would roll out an update that encourages website owners who have a mobile-friendly site. Below we explain how you can easily check and protect that your website is safe from the dreadful Mobiledeggon.

TL;DR: A major algorithm change from Google is coming April 21. This article explains why this is happening and how to make sure your site is protected.

You may be asking why is Mobilegeddon happening? If you think about it simply we are relying on our phones increasingly in our daily lives, from quick searches to consuming content. With the ever-improving performance of hardware and software in our technology it only makes sense as to why Google would want websites to be mobile optimized. The market for consumers looking for efficient and accessible computers is huge. So big in fact that the internet market is started to replace the need for desktops in from mobile usage becoming a more part of our daily lives of browsing. Simply put, mobile and tablets are slowly supplementing desktops. As of mid-2014, the amount of time spent on browsing the internet on desktops has been surpassed by mobile:

2007–2015 Growth of internet users for Mobile vs. Desktop

Not implying that Desktop is dying in any way. However, certain users who were traditionally browsing on desktops are migrating to mobile and at a rapidly growing rate due to improved software and hardware. Companies like Apple are making over 6x the revenue of desktops from mobile and tablets, which grossed over $3.36bn in 2015 alone. In a recent report by ComScore shows that that apps are a distinguished leader of this shift of how we browse the internet. While browsing the internet on mobile is steadily inclining MoM:

Feb 2013 — Jan 2014 US Time Spent using the internet (Source: ComScore, Inc)

A brief summary of the events to come:

This new update is designed to benefit mobile-friendly websites. This will include both responsive and separate mobile sites. An estimated 60% of Google searches are now performed on mobile devices, so it’s only logical that the search results will cater to this. In a 2015 analysis by Monetate, E-Commerce conversion rates showed that tablets had nearly equal conversion rates with desktops:

What devices convert the highest overall in 2015 (Source: Monetate)

The change will also affect what types of results Google will generate. Though only websites have been shown in the past, future searches may suggest apps and other online tools. Though the only way to keep a site active against these tools is to make sure it is full of valuable content.

If you don’t prepare your site for mobile an adverse effect could come on your website due to this algorithm change could put a dent in the company’s success. Currently, Google is looking for the semantic relations of the site. This includes being ‘consumer-friendly’ by the simplicity of UI and clarity of content, as well as interactions. Let’s face it. At the end of the day, the more sites that do well with traffic and sales = more profit for Google = $$$.

5 Ways to Protect Your Site from Mobilegeddon: