Fortune 500 On The Offensive After Mobilegeddon

Two weeks ago, Google rolled out an update to its search algorithm designed to reward mobile-friendly websites with higher rankings on search engine results pages (SERPs). Google announced the update – infamously known as “Mobilegeddon” – two months prior to its implementation to give websites time to make the necessary changes before having their organic traffic penalized.

Over the course of those two months, we’ve seen an incredible 4.7% increase in mobile-friendly websites as companies and websites everywhere recognize the importance of mobile (or at least the importance of search).

Despite the uptick, however, not all websites made the cut-off. A new report by The Motley Fool indicates that 46% of Fortune 500 websites and 29% of the top 500 e-commerce sites have yet to achieve Google’s mobile-friendly designation.

Companies everywhere are facing the consequences of not prioritizing mobile.

It’s too soon to determine the full wrath of Mobilegeddon, but we do know that these companies stand a lot to lose from lower rankings – especially for those companies with more mobile-friendly competitors competing for the same search keywords.

Yoast.com, a leader in web search optimization, did a little poking around to see what the change in Google’s search algorithm meant for one German news portal, onlinekosten.de:

You can see the dramatic reduction in mobile SEO visibility corresponding precisely with Mobilegeddon’s rollout in the week of April 19 – April 26.

Equally damaging is what this chart looks like the site’s biggest (and mobile-friendly) competitor, check24.de:

Mobile SEO visibility for check24 spiked as it usurped onlinekosten’s rankings – meaning that in addition to onlinekosten losing out on online traffic as a result of not being sufficiently mobile-friendly, the site giving its competition a new advantage as well.

And it gets worse.

These companies may be missing out on more opportunities than just that coveted SERP positions, however. In 2014, mobile accounted for 46.5% of all online traffic and 23% of all online retail sales. As mobile becomes the platform of choice for more and more shoppers, traditional retailers are sacrificing massive growth opportunities by not changing their engagement and business strategy to adapt to the changing expectations and lifestyles of their customers.

The proof is in the data. The Fortune 500 and retailers worldwide now, more than ever, need to start thinking about mobile, lest their more mobile-friendly competitors beat them to the punch.

Related Content:

• Rethinking The Mobile Surveys vs. Web Surveys Debate: Why All Surveys Are Now Mobile
• How Retailers Are Using Mobile To Close the Customer Experience Gap (SlideShare)
• App Discovery Enhanced with Paid Search in the Google Play Store