The Winning Combination of Mobile-Friendly Design and Local SEO for Your Success

You may have heard people say stuff like "I do sometimes forget my ID card for work, but never my Smartphone!" You can't blame them. Mobile phones have become a default device in our daily lives, and it is something that we find difficult to part with. We not only use it for talking to our loved ones, but we also need it for browsing the Internet, shopping and what not! There are more than 2.6 billion smart phone users across the globe and the numbers keep increasing.

With so many connected devices and easy browsing through smartphones, no wonder that the focus of people has ideally shifted from desktop to these handheld devices. This has, in turn, paved way to a huge push in mobile-oriented websites and mobile-friendly marketing. This shift can surely bring in better results for businesses around the world. However, in this particular scenario, attaining success isn't possible without implementing local SEO.

Here, we are going to discuss how to adopt a mobile-first strategy with the help of a responsive website and keen focus on local SEO to reap maximum results.

Creating a mobile-friendly website

If you own a website, which is not mobile friendly, this is the first thing to be completed before moving ahead with any SEO strategy. Some pointers towards this need are as mentioned below:

• Mobile internet usage surpassed the PC rate in 2015 itself and now it is 51% mobile VS. 42% PC.
• As per the latest update by Google for their search engine algorithm, more than 40% of the websites failed the mobile-friendliness test which will adversely affect their search engine positioning.
• As per research conducted by

pro SEO team, more than 58% of Americans do have smartphones and about 55% of the web traffic comes through these.

Responsive design

Mobile friendly design is a must for the future websites. This should be the primary concern if you have a plan for a new website. Anyone coming to your website should be able to easily view and navigate through it from mobile devices of any screen size.

There are multiple ways to design mobile-friendly websites, but the most recommended technique is responsive design. These designs have the ability to custom-set the dimensions and auto-adjust the layout and presentation based on the size of the screen on which it is being viewed.

Local SEO optimization

The next part of optimization strategy involves enhancing the mobile experience to users by focusing on optimizing for local SEO searches. Researches have shown that majority of the smartphone users are highly interested in searching for the local results on the go than being generic. Some of the stats supporting this point include:

A study done by Ipsos MediaCT says that 88% of the smart phone users specifically conduct local searches.

The ComScore study found that about 78% of local-mobile searches end up in a purchase.

60% of mobile users respond to search ads with location information.

So mobile responsive design and local SEO need to go hand-in-hand. The new generation entrepreneurs can do business lead generation and online promotions by effectively administering these modalities. Be focused and learn more about it to earn more.

Sujain Thomas is Data IT professional and blogger