Which are the steps, criteria and tools to make sure your site is ready for Google's mobile first index? Take a look!

1. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
ENTERING GOOGLE’S
MOBILE FIRST INDEX
A CHECKLIST TO BE READY

2. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Google’s Mobile First Index is now here
https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2018/03/rolling-out-mobile-first-indexing.html

3. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Meaning that Google will now primarily crawl and index
our Mobile Websites versions to rank them
https://developers.google.com/search/mobile-sites/mobile-first-indexing#best-practices

4. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
How can you know if your site has been
already migrated to the Mobile First Index?
#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti

5. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
“We are notifying sites that are migrating to
mobile-first indexing via Search Console”

6. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
“Site owners will see significantly increased
crawl rate from the Smartphone Googlebot”
Screaming Frog Log Analyser & SEOlyzer.io

7. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
“Google will show the mobile version of pages
in Search results and Google cached pages” … oops!

8. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Whether your site has
been already moved
or not, here’s what you
need to make it Mobile
First ready
#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti

9. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
This goes beyond than passing
Google’s Mobile Friendly Validation
https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly

10. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Google itself has shared best practices
for each type of mobile configuration
https://developers.google.com/search/mobile-sites/mobile-first-indexing#best-practices

11. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
There’s no change needed for responsive Websites
since the content is the same for mobile and desktop

12. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
This also happens with canonical AMP, since the
content is the same again for both mobile and desktop

13. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
If you use non-canonical AMP, then this is not indexed and
is your original Web mobile version that will be assessed

14. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
However, change is needed w/ dynamic Websites, since
although the URLs are the same, the HTMLs are different

15. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
The same happens w/ independent mobile sites, since their
HTMLs are also different and shown through separate URLs

16. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Here are the validations to do if you have
dynamic serving or independent mobile sites

17. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Your mobile site should include the same content as your
desktop one, this will be the content that will get ranked now
> MobileDesktop

18. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Don’t do this
> MobileDesktop

19. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Hiding the content of your mobile site pages
won’t be an issue as long as it is in the HTML

20. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Titles and meta descriptions should be equivalent
across both versions of your site too
Mobile
Desktop
=

21. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Structured data should also be present on both
desktop as well as Mobile HTMLs as well
Mobile
Desktop
=

22. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Independent mobile sites will additionally
require the following changes
#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti

23. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Make sure to not block your m-dot subdomain and
that your robots.txt is consistent with the desktop one
VS

24. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
International sites should add hreflang annotations in the
Mobile pages too, many sites only do it in the desktop ones
Mobile
Desktop

25. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
You also need to update hreflang annotations in the Mobile
pages, to refer to the Mobile URLs as alternates in this case
Mobile
Desktop

26. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
However, you don’t need to change the independent
mobile rel alternate and canonical tags configuration
Mobile
Desktop

27. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Like this, but without changing the canonical tags,
that should keep pointing to the desktop URLs
Correct
Incorrect

28. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
You can easily generate the hreflang tags for your
mobile URLs by using the hreflang generator tool
https://www.aleydasolis.com/english/international-seo-tools/hreflang-tags-generator/

29. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Besides this you
need to continue
following already
existing mobile
Web
optimisation best
practices
#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti

30. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Mobile pop-ups update
Avoiding intrusive mobile pop-ups and insterstitials
displayed when loading your mobile pages
https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2016/08/helping-users-easily-access-content-on.html

31. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Use app banners or pop-ups that don’t cover
the whole screen instead

32. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Mobile speed is also now more important with the Mobile
first index as it is becoming a ranking factor
https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2018/01/using-page-speed-in-mobile-search.html

33. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti#mobilefirstseo at #TuringFest by @aleyda from @orainti#mobilefirstseo at #TuringFest by @aleyda from @orainti
Identify which are your slower pages with more
mobile traffic to prioritise their speed validation
Google Analytics

34. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
You can check these pages loading times and top speed
issues by using Lighthouse within Chrome’s Developers Tools

35. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Obtaining the resources that need to be optimised from
the validated pages as well as the recommendations

36. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
If you can’t optimise your own speed at all, you can use AMP
instead as its speed will be taken into account instead
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-speed-update-25094.html

37. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
AMP will likely provide a faster page alternative
by using cached pre-optimised resources
Original Mobile URL AMP URL
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/43949470 https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/amp/43949470
https://www.aleydasolis.com/en/search-engine-optimization/amp-accelerated-mobile-pages/

38. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
However, remember AMP is not a replacement
of your own mobile site in case you don’t have one

39. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
You should then
revise all this by
doing a parity
Mobile vs.
Desktop Audit
#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti

40. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Crawl your site with the desktop and mobile Googlebots
by using SEO crawlers and compare their results
VS
Screaming Frog, Deepcrawl, Botify, OnCrawl, Sitebulb

41. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Check out Everett’s guide to easily check and compare
desktop vs. mobile configuration and content
https://moz.com/blog/mobile-parity-audits

42. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
You can now use Deepcrawl’s new functionality to check
independent mobile vs. desktop pages in the same crawl
Deepcrawl

43. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
You will be able to validate the mobile site configuration,
crawlability, indexability and compare its content
Deepcrawl

44. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Last but not least:
Don’t forget to
also monitor your
organic Mobile
search activity
#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti

45. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Remember to register the independent mobile site profile
in the Google Search Console to monitor its activity
Google Search Console

46. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
Check the mobile vs. desktop queries and pages trend
to identify issues, opportunities and gap of behaviour
Google Search Console

47. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
As well as any potential crawling and indexing issue to be
additionally solved following the previously shared principles
Google Search Console

48. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
We ran out of time… but you should be ready now!

49. #mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti#mobilefirstchecklist at #smxlondon by @aleyda from @orainti
It’s time to go