28% of CAC 40 companies are not mobile friendly

On February 26, 2015, Google announced its algorithm update regarding the ranking of mobile sites. The search engine hasn’t accustomed us to announcing its updates in advance, but this time it was in the American giant’s interest that everyone could get up to date… A worldwide overview of mobile sites suited to smartphone browsing (so-called “Mobile Friendly” sites).

What is Mobilegeddon?

The significance of this algorithm change is shaking the Internet, and the American press even gave it a nickname: Mobilegeddon, a portmanteau merging the words “Mobile” and “Armageddon.” This update to Google’s algorithm aims to favor sites that allow browsing on a smartphone. All “Mobile Friendly” pages will soon be highlighted in mobile search results, with the “mobile site” label.

When will Google roll out this update?

The Google update is already underway! Since April 21, 2015, Google has been taking into account whether a site is mobile-friendly or not. The update will be gradual but will concern all countries and all languages. We don’t yet know to what extent positions in Google Search will be affected. However, this will inevitably impact the traffic of sites that are not mobile friendly, as internet users looking for information on mobile — often in a hurry and not always having an optimal connection — will more readily choose sites bearing the “mobile site” label displayed by the search engine, for the sake of efficiency. This will inevitably affect the CTR (Click Through Rate) of mobile sites. Note that this update will only concern the organic results of Google Search on mobile phones.

France: is the CAC 40 mobile friendly?

One might think that CAC 40 companies, with their in-house experts, their armies of communication agencies, digital strategy agencies, or even SEO agencies, would all be ready for this revolution. And yet, at D+2, our team finds that 27.5% of the homepages of CAC 40 corporate sites are not mobile friendly. A study carried out at D-14 had found that 33% of these sites were not adapted to mobile (1). Since then, some companies have therefore taken their mobile future in hand!

United States: are “Fortune 500” companies mobile friendly?

Another big surprise: the United States is no better off. Indeed, the 500 American companies with the largest revenue still have a bit of work to do as well… According to the recent TechCrunch article, 44% of Fortune 500 companies are not mobile friendly.

United Kingdom: the poor performers of mobile browsing…

According to a recent study by The Search Agency picked up by the English media (2), only 33% of FTSE companies (the 100 British companies with the highest market capitalization on the London Stock Exchange) have adapted their site to mobile browsing and are indexed as such in Google; while 28% have 2 sites, a mobile site and a desktop site, but unfortunately the “mobile site” label is not indicated in Google search results since it’s the “desktop” site’s homepage that is indexed (a purely SEO issue), and finally 38% of FTSE sites are simply not “mobile friendly.”

Who benefits from the crime?

Why warn in advance? It’s in Google’s interest for mobile-friendly sites to develop, in order to create a space where internet users can fully experience mobile browsing. In the mobile era, Google must offer a quality user experience to maintain its status as a high-performing search engine. Moreover, today the ads displayed on smartphones are less profitable for Google and for advertisers.

By thus encouraging advertisers to adapt to mobile usage and to adapt their sites to its update, Google believes it will improve the return on investment of its advertisers’ Adwords campaigns, who will be able to pay more for mobile Adwords ads.

Adapting to mobile browsing is becoming essential

The figures are compelling: to be visible on the Internet today, a site must be viewable on mobile. Indeed, mobile now represents more than 60% of Web traffic (3). And yet, sites are not ready, particularly in France where 64% of sites do not offer navigation specific to this device, according to the study carried out by Yooda. Finally, if you’re not yet convinced, note that AtInternet (4) recorded an average increase of 68% in traffic for mobile sites in June 2014.

How do I know if my site is mobile friendly?

To check whether a site’s pages are, yes or no, mobile friendly

– on mobile (tablets are not concerned), Google indicates it with the “mobile site” label

– with Google’s “Mobile Friendly test” tool.

– with the “Mobile Usability” tool in Google Webmaster Tools.

And if we’re not? How do you make a site mobile friendly?

The user experience appears to hold a preponderant place in adapting to mobile browsing. Here are a few examples for making your site mobile-ready!

– Adapt the size of the content to the viewport in order to offer a better user experience; the content should not be wider than the screen.

– Adapt the font size, which must be large enough to be legible.

– Space links out sufficiently to allow visitors to click on them.

– Avoid plugins that prevent smartphones from displaying content.

Since Google’s announcement, companies have grown worried about seeing their rankings affected. They had only a few weeks to adapt to mobile browsing, sometimes an impossible mission. Notably for some SMEs that had not planned budgets in this direction. At a time when Google has been accused of abusing its dominant position in Europe, this algorithm update nonetheless seems to reinforce the disparities between sites with unequal resources. However, from a purely user standpoint, it’s clear that this update is beneficial.

Sources:

(1) Synodiance study

(2) The Search Agency study picked up by Cityam.com

(3) according to a study by the ComScore institute

(4) Web trends, Q2 2014, AT INTERNET