“Mobiwebolized” Search Marketing

Going mobile

Author: Greg Laptevsky
Publish Date: June 13, 2007
Category: Marketing & Revenue Growth
Tags: mobile devices, design, development

If you're one of the big guys at the top of the search engine organic results, your business is probably doing pretty well. For the rest of us, there’s an “early bird” special. It’s called mobile search, and it just might be the search marketing redemption you were looking for.

Why? Even though the industry is just really in its infancy, many professionals are saying it is the inevitable future of search engine marketing (SEM). Consider this: According to a June 2006 Telephia Mobile Internet report, there were 34.6 million U.S. mobile users. And as new gadgets such as iPhone roll out, there will undoubtedly be many more. What does that mean in terms of search engine marketing? The answer is simple: time to get your websites “mobiwebolized.”

In most cases regular SEM logic applies, however there are couple of important exceptions: different bots will be crawling your site, so make sure they can see the content you have. Avoid all unnecessary code, and keep things clean. Get user agent/client detection script to identify mobile browser for best possible user experience. Separate content from design with CSS, and make use of relative positioning to ensure that things fit nicely on small mobile device screens. Rethink navigation: Place most important “jump links” on the top of the page, followed by main content and navigation. Don’t try to stick your entire navigation on top — users will soon get annoyed of scrolling. Add a “click to call” button: The customer is on the phone already — why not have his/her call you? Validate your site with code checkers and also create/submit sitemaps to the search engines. Keep in mind that mobile Internet browsing is still a rather painful experience (small screens, slow speeds, etc.). However, if you can deliver quality content on a user-friendly mobile site, you’ll be the king of the hill.

Our world is not only going global, but also going mobile.