The growing importance of mobile SEO [infographic]

A useful summary of changing consumer search behaviour and mobile SEO best practices

This infographic highlights again the growing importance of mobile marketing; in this case showing its impact on search marketing. We're reminded that there are now more than 4 billion connected smartphones and it's anticipated that mobile usage will overtake desktop use by 2014. So don't miss out is the message! Although the headline on the infographic focuses on Google's Siri, it also has a useful summary of the alternatives for optimising mobile search.

This Infographic from Alchemy Viral explores consumer usage, best practices for mobile SEO and the improvements of Siri to support consumers.

Best practices on mobile SEO

Here is a summary from the infographic of best practices for mobile SEO to consider.

1. Responsive web design. Considered industry best practice and is recommended by Google. This includes using CSS media queries for device rendering, and using uniformed HTML across all devices.
2. Dynamic Serving. Google notes that different HTML can dynamically live on the same URL if responsive design is not optimal.
3. Separate mobile URLs. Fair game, and do not actually affect organic search traffic, nor weaken your “link juice” as mobile users may have different needs to desktop users and thus need different copy messaging.
4. Sites first, apps later!. Apps are limited in their reach, while sites will drive traffic. 50% of consumers would not recommend a business with a bad mobile site, while 40% said they would use a competing business if it provided a better mobile experience.
5. Researching your mobile audience. Prior to creating your mobile site, it is imperative to understand the wants and needs of whom you are trying to reach.
6. Broaden your topic scope. Mobile users search differently than desktop surfers; often times they ask very specific questions and sometimes they use voice requests.
7. Use internal mobile site search tools. Pay close attention to your mobile traffic in web analytics and identify unique mobile searches and referrers. Doing this will help you further profile your mobile users’ needs.
8. Optimise your mobile content. Mobile users are often on the go and do not have the same goals as those sitting behind a computer. Create custom mobile content to give researchers exactly what are looking for.
9. Accessible desktop pages to mobile searchers. Point blank: An unreachable desktop page is unusable to mobile searchers.
10. Content, content and content. Content needs to be useful, entertaining, or both - will help attract links from other sites increasing your mobile search reputation.
11. Maximise Site Speed. A faster site will provide a better mobile user experience.
12. Optimise socially. Optimising social profiles for social topics will add to your site’s relevancy since most people often access their social media through mobile technology.