SMX Advanced session recap: Mobile-first and AMP

I covered the

Mobile-First & AMP For The Advanced SEO session from SMX Advanced. The session included the always impressive Alexis Sanders, Technical SEO Account Manager at Merkle, as well as new-to-me Kevin Malarick, SEO manager, product at Edmunds Inc.

Alexis Sanders, Merkle

Alexis was up first as she blazed through a ton of information on mobile and accelerated mobile pages (AMP). She started her presentation by asking, “Why mobile?”

More people are accessing the internet via mobile both domestically and globally, and Google is adapting.

The issue is that mobile is not the same as desktop. Mobile has its own challenges, including:

1. Smaller screen sizes.

2. Fat-finger issues.

3. Forms.

4. Mobile devices are slower, and mobile networks are slower.

5. Data consumption is growing.

6. Traffic is split between browsers and apps.

7. We get stressed out by mobile delays. Our stress levels when a mobile page loads slowly are higher than when watching a horror movie (and slightly less than when doing a math problem).

8. Behavior.

9. 81 percent of people still convert on a desktop.

10. CTR on devices is different; desktops outperformed mobile.

Mobile-first indexing

What is mobile-first indexing? According to Google, “Mobile first indexing means Google will predominantly use the mobile version of the content for indexing and ranking.”

[Read the full article on Search Engine Land.]