Google's John Mueller responded to a question about whether it's okay to stop optimizing the desktop version of a website now that Google has switched to indexing only the mobile version of websites.
The question relates to an announcement made a week ago.
“…a small number of sites that are crawled by Googlebot desktop will be crawled by Googlebot mobile after July 5, 2024. …After July 5, 2024, these sites will be crawled and indexed by Googlebot smartphones only. If your site's content is completely inaccessible on mobile devices, it will not be indexed.”
Do you want to stop optimizing the desktop version of your site?
The asker wanted to know if it was okay to abandon optimizing the desktop version of the site and focus only on the mobile-friendly version, since he was new to the company and his developers were well underway developing a mobile-only version of the site.
The questions are:
“I am currently in discussions with a new company because we are implementing a separate mobile site via dynamic serving instead of making it responsive. My idea is that by having two code bases, in addition to requirements like http header changes, we will have to crawl, analyze and optimize two websites instead of one. However, this was rejected with the reason that “Mobile-first indexing means that the desktop website no longer needs to be optimized for SEO”. I have read all the Google docs etc but could not find any reason why the desktop website needs to continue to be improved for SEO (crawlability, indexability, using correct HTML etc). What could be the reason? Can you help?”
Mobile-specific and responsive websites
Google's John Mueller explained the benefits of one version of a responsive website, which eliminates the need to maintain two websites and makes it desktop-friendly for site visitors who visit the site on a desktop browser.
He replied:
“First of all, not making a responsive site in this day and age seems strange to me. Some sites haven't been updated for a long time, and they may need some maintenance for a while, but if you're making a new site,
It's a good idea to keep your site desktop-friendly
Mueller then listed reasons why it's wise to maintain a functional desktop version of your website, including for other search engines, crawlers, and site visitors who are actually using desktop devices: Most SEOs understand that conversions, and therefore revenue from your website, depend on your ability to reach all of your site visitors. This is the bigger picture. Optimizing your site for Google is only part of the picture, but it's not the whole picture in itself.
Mueller explained:
“With mobile indexing, it's true that Google focuses on the mobile version of web search indexing. However, there are other search engines and crawlers/requesters, and there are other requests that use desktop user agents (we mentioned some in a recent blog post, but there are also non-search user agents on our user agent documentation page).”
He went on to say that websites don't just exist to be crawled and ranked by Google.
“Overall, I don't think you can completely ignore what's offered on desktop in terms of SEO and related things. If you had to choose one and the only reason you have a site is for Google SEO, you'd probably choose mobile now, but this is an artificial decision. Sites don't exist in a vacuum, and your business does more than Google SEO (and, honestly, I hope you do – a good mix of traffic sources gives you peace of mind). And if you don't want to make this decision, go responsive.”
When the questioner explained that the decision to focus on mobile had already been made, Mueller replied that this was a case of picking fights.
“If this is an ongoing project, moving to dynamic delivery is already a pretty big step forward. Pick your battles :). Depending on your existing site, it might be better to release a sub-optimal but better version earlier than waiting for the ideal version to be ready. Keep the fact that it's dynamic delivery in mind when working with tools you use to diagnose, monitor and track. It's more work, but not impossible. Make sure the desktop version isn't completely ignored :). There might also be room to extend what your team (developers + leads) feel comfortable with. Maybe a small part of the site people can work on to make it responsive. Good luck!”
Will you pick a fight or resist?
John Mueller correctly points out that sometimes it's better to pick your fights than to stick with compromise, but make sure your proposals are on the record and so are the voices of those who disagree, so that when things go wrong, blame can be placed back on those responsible.
Featured image: Shutterstock/Luis Molinero