Mobile Search explores the differences in search behavior on mobile devices, as well as the key differences between desktop and mobile search results. Columnists provide tips for mobile SEO and SEM campaigns, while uncovering the latest trends and technology employed by smartphone and tablet applications to deliver real-time search results to mobile device users.

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WAP Search is Dead! Long Live WAP Search

May 21, 2012 at 12:05pm ET by Cindy Krum

If you are a technophile, an online marketing specialist or a mobile marketer it can be easy to forget that a large part of your target market might not own a smartphone. This can be especially true if your demographic is broad reaching, and includes the upper and lower ends of the age spectrum (those not between the ages of 21 and 64). While it is always growing, smartphone ownership at the end of 2011 was still at only 30% for people in the 55-65 age group, and less than 18% for people 65 and older. On the other side of the age spectrum, only 38% of 13 to 17 year olds owned a smartphon [...]

Smartphone Bot Case Study: The Google Smartphone Bot On Holiday In Australia

May 14, 2012 at 12:59pm ET by Cindy Krum

While Google’s new smartphone bot has been announced, it does not appear to be widely deployed yet; at least that is what I said during a recent presentation in Sydney, where I had the pleasure of meeting Alistair Lattimore (Al). Al does CRO, SEO and agency management for Mantra Group, which is the second largest accommodation provider in Australia with over 100 hotels, retreats and resorts throughout Australia and New Zealand. Al was at the talk in Sydney and let me know that the smartphone bot had visited some of the sites he is responsible for and told me about the initial results. Man [...]

Related Topics: Google: Mobile | Mobile Search

When & How Is The New Smartphone Bot Affecting Search Results?

May 7, 2012 at 1:18pm ET by Cindy Krum

Even though Google has launched a smartphone bot to improve mobile search results and the user experience on smartphones, it doesn’t mean that everything in mobile SEO has changed. Google is still detecting what handset users are searching from, and adapting the results that they send based on the handset; some phones are set up to pull from the desktop index using mobile indicators and phone-specific ranking factors. Other phones will trigger the mobile-only index that has been in play for a long time, serving mostly feature phones, older HTC and Windows Mobile phones and BlackBerrys. [...]

7 Real Mobile Duplicate Content SEO Issues

Apr 30, 2012 at 12:14pm ET by Bryson Meunier

Ask someone who’s new to mobile SEO about it and they’re almost sure to tell you that mobile sites are duplicate content. The fear is that having the same content on two URLs will do the same thing it does in traditional SEO and split link equity and social shares, making it more difficult for either page to rank. In reality, with Google’s Old Possum/Skip Redirect update in December, user agent redirection is all that’s necessary for mobile sites to rank ahead of desktop sites in smartphone search, even if it’s the same content formatted differently. With canonical tags back to [...]

Mobile SEO Is A Must For Acquiring Mobile Shoppers

Apr 23, 2012 at 12:01pm ET by Sherwood Stranieri

Owners of ecommerce sites are a pretty observant bunch. The clarity that sales provide (or lack thereof) can make marketing a bit easier to quantify. There isn't a need to tie promotional activities back to branding metrics, or tricky-to-quantify engagement on the site ("Do we want more page views, or do less views mean the site delivered on the first try?") Thanks to that clarity, store owners keep a close eye on their data, and have probably seen mobile devices show-up on their radar a lot more than they used to. Combine that with the buzz around smartphones, and the idea of a store ap [...]

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