Webmasters and SEO strategists may soon require embracing some major changes in their approach to SEO as Google prepares to switch to mobile versions of websites for determining search engine results page (SERP).
The internet giant has gone on record stating that instead of main desktop sites, it will now turn its search indexing system mostly mobile-driven. Google is already introducing some minor tweaks to the system in order to introduce the initial phases of the transformation process. However, the whole process may take some time before coming into full effect.
“Although our search index will continue to be a single index of websites and apps, our algorithms will eventually primarily use the mobile version of a site’s content to rank pages from that site,” Doantam Phan, product manager for Google, stated in a blog post.
While the company is not revealing much for obvious reasons, it seems that Google’s internal teams will first administer small-scale experiments over the coming months. Only when the company is sure that the shift will lead to significant enhancement of the overall user experience, the transformation to mobile-centric search indexing will be implemented on a large scale.
”If you have a responsive site or a dynamic serving site where the primary content and markup is equivalent across mobile and desktop, you shouldn’t have to change anything,” Phan advised webmasters who might prefer getting started with their preparations already.
He also urged webmasters to reach out to the Google team working on the project via Webmaster forums or the company’s public events.
Meanwhile, you can read the full set of initial recommendations for webmasters by clicking here.