Category: Mobile Marketing

One of the top challenges to mobile SEO is the proper use of pre-existing content.

Those who are new to mobile face a significant challenge with their SEO efforts, as they fear using duplicate content from their traditional site onto their mobile optimized website, which could cause them to lose their ranks with the top search engines.

The reality is that properly formatted content will not be penalized if it is duplicated between traditional and mobile sites.

That said, it is vital that proper formatting and use be achieved, or the risk of losing the best ranks will still exist. The following are the characteristics which must be avoided by mobile websites in order to make certain that you are not causing yourself more harm than good:

• Splitting link equity with app promotion – don’t over-promote your app in the free space on your traditional website as there is a small chance that the platform-specific URLs will be linked and shared instead of the homepage.

• Diluting link equity with carrier pages – even though Google’s webmaster guidelines for mobile no longer state that a duplicate page should not be created for each carrier, it is still wise to avoid the behavior.

• Duplicates between indexed transcoder and legacy sites – if a transcoder was originally used to build a mobile presence, but an in-house site has since been created, the many duplicates could be the result.

• Cross domain duplicates in other forms – though the mobile content from transcoded sites is the most common form of cross-domain duplication of content, there are some other examples of the same site being hosted by several domains without canonical tags to tell search engines which is the primary location. This can hurt the ability to achieve a competitive rank.

• Showcasing the mobile optimized website on the traditional site – creating desktop pages meant to advertise mobile sites can generate mobile site results when they are intended for desktop users. Even worse, those results often outrank the official mobile site.

• Doubled WAP sites – this can occur when a site was originally created for a feature phone but another was built to replace it for a smartphone.

• Promoting the apps ahead of the mobile site – when the mobile app is promoted more heavily than the optimized website, content is often duplicated for the same channel and the link equity is divided. At the same time this will not create additional shares or links that would help to competitively boost the overall rank. The mobile web should always be promoted first.

The last year has made it especially clear that mobile is not a fad but a revolution in marketing

With the rapidly increasing penetration of smartphones and tablet computers, mobile has changed the way that people conduct their daily lives.

It starts with their alarms in the morning to the maintenance of their work and school schedules, topic research, communications – verbal, text, email, social networking, etc. – and even their shopping. Companies and brands of all sizes have not failed to recognize this important trend, and are now seeking ways to embrace this technology so that they can take advantage of the tremendous opportunities that it has to offer.

Google has been a central organization in the efforts to go mobile (GoMo) for many companies.

It is continually presenting an increasing wealth of information and resources so that companies of all sizes can understand what they need to do to become a part of the mobile web, and begin spending their advertising dollars there. This is, after all, how the search engine giant makes a significant amount of its income. Therefore, the better informed and equipped the business world can be in going mobile and marketing there, the more everyone will benefit over the long term.

There are, according to Google, five primary questions that every business should ask itself.

This questions were whittled down from the broader concepts that make up the mobile marketing world and are the heart of any strategy or campaign that can be successfully run using that channel. They are the following:

• How will the value proposition be changed by mobile? This includes how the mobile customer will be served by the company, the way in which local consumers can be targeted, and the challenge relating to price transparency.

• How will the company’s digital consumer resources be changed by mobile? For example, the mobile optimization of the website, or the development of an app.

• Is the company actually embracing mobile technology in a way that is meaningful and accountable, both to operations and the consumer?

• How should mobile marketing be adopted by the company? This includes multi-channel marketing, a mobile search strategy, and using this technology for building the brand.

• How can the tablet consumer be specifically addressed? This includes the specific needs of tablet users and how they are different from smartphone owners, and the implementation of tablet commerce strategies.