In a recent blog post, Google predicted that mobile search will be bigger than ever this holiday season. That’s not surprising, since more people have smart phones than ever before and they know how to use them. So with holiday season just weeks away, the question is, have you prepared your online presence for the mobile world? If not, there are a few things you can do to get prepared now.
- Make sure your website is mobile friendly. If you don’t have a smart phone, borrow one and browse your website on the device. Is it easy to navigate? Is it easy to find the content that your visitors may be looking for and can you read it? If you answer no to any of these questions, then it’s time to get your site mobile ready.
- Local SEO. Although it takes time to get ranked on the search engines, with an aggressive Local Search Optimization campaign, you should be able to get more visibility on mobile devices in time for the holidays. If you start now.
- Review your Local listings on Google, Yahoo!, and Bing. Make sure all your information is up to date. Add your holiday specials and sales. Often, when someone finds your business on a mobile device, they may only get to your Google+ Local page, and never get to your site. Treat this page, along with the Yahoo! and Bing pages like another website. Keep your content up to date and relevant.
The holiday season is the biggest example of how the web is shifting from a stationary desktop environment to a mobile world. Your visitors can search wherever they are, and they are doing just that. Make sure that your competition isn’t keeping all that business to themselves. This is the most important time of year to focus on mobile online marketing.