Mobile-first indexing isn’t news – but with the Holidays just around the corner, it may as well be. Google most recent report ‘Masters of Mobile: Australia and New Zealand Report‘ revealed that 84% of Aussies conducted pre-purchase research on smartphones and 65% abandon a poorly designed mobile site.
Our biggest challenge, according to Google, is speed, with mobile sites within both Aussie and NZ loading at nine seconds on average. That’s much slower than the recommended three seconds, with 53% of mobile site visits likely to be abandoned if they load any longer than that.
Source: Think with Google
Here are three quick fixes from Google to increase site speed:
Lighten the website by compressing images and text.
Reduce server response time by reducing HTTP Photo Editing Services requests and DNS lookups
Cache static objects to avoid repetitive browser requests.
Be Active on Google My Business
As we get closer and closer to shopping crunch time, people are more likely to Google for the products and services they’re looking for. When they find your Google My Business profile, you’ll want it to be updated with the latest offers, store hours, photos and posts so you can secure that conversion.
Google My Business offers plenty of tools that businesses can use to their advantages, such as creating product offers and content posts. People also go to Google for authentic reviews and photos (Google has been pushing for local contributions), so you want your business to stay updated and stand out from the competition.
It’s also smart to update your store or office hours to accommodate for the holiday hours – whether that’s late nights or closing days.