What's the best way to redirect mobile site?
-
Hi,
We have a mobile website using a sub-directory domain.com/m/whatever-page/. Our mobile is completely separate site from desktop version.
What's the best way to handle the redirection from mobile visitors and those that are searching from mobile and see desktop version in the search result?
Appreciate anyone's expert advise.
Thanks,
Willy -
I've responded to specific comments below, but here's the information you need to redirect: https://developers.google.com/webmasters/smartphone-sites/details
The gist is, you need:
- 301 or 302 redirects from the desktop site to the mobile site, based on user agent detection
- Rel="canonical" tag on each mobile page pointing to to each desktop page
- Rel="alternate" tag on each desktop page pointing to each mobile page
- A Vary HTTP header
- A mobile sitemap
As I mentioned below, I also recommend that you have a link at the bottom of the mobile and desktop sites pointing to the other version. That way, if you get the redirects wrong, people can self correct.
-
I disagree with Lesley, saying that you should just ask. I would recommend that you redirect to the mobile version of the the site, then ask. Basically: get people onto the page that you're 90% sure they want to be on, but let them switch back and forth. Just add a link to the footer of the deskop and mobile sites letting people switch between the two.
He's correct about redirecting to the right page, though. Don't redirect all of your desktop pages to the mobile homepage. When Google ranks your desktop pages on mobile search results, it checks out the redirect to mobile content. If the mobile content isn't similar, the page won't rank in mobile.
-
The best way to handle redirects is to use a 301 or 302 redirect (this is probably the only time in SEO that either gives the same result) based on user agent detection.
Is that enough detail?
-
Just to add to our original question. It seems pretty clear that device detection is accomplished by user agent detection. Under our original plan to redirect visitors on mobiles to a new URL which carries the mobile version of the page, how should that redirection be accomplished in a search engine compatible fashion? What type of redirection should be used?
I suspect we'll need to continue with our plan to redirect to a different URL for now, but am concerned that this needs to happen in a way which won't harm our SEO.
many thanks in advance for any help with this ....
-
Thanks Leslie, interesting and useful considerations.
-
The best way is to ask. With the ever changing landscape of devices, automatically redirecting is falling out of favor. I would use a cookied little bar at the bottom of the page that asks if they want to view the mobile site. Let them select or close it and have it expire after the session.
One thing to keep in mind, google wants you to redirect to the same mobile page. Like if a user is on site.com/products/nifty-hair-gizmo.html don't redirect them to m.site.com, redirect them to m.site.com/products/nifty-hair-gizmo.html
The reason that automatically redirecting is falling out is because of devices like the new chrome cast and how other phones are set up. I might browse to your site on my phone and be casting it to my 46" lcd and you would never know. But I am going to be irritated if I have to look at your site in a mobile version on my tv.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Viewing search results for 'When searching in google we find our site in the first position but when some others search it is seen on the second page 1 st position why is this happening?'
Viewing search results for 'When searching in google we find our site in the first position but when some others search it is seen on the second page 1 st position why is this happening?'
Search Behavior | | Alyaauditors0 -
Deceptive site warning from Google: Java script and meta descriptions deployed.
Hi all, We received a deceptive site warning from Google recently. Seems like there is a deceptive content on some pages of the website. Some pages are removed from Google index. Meta descriptions have been deployed on the site few days ago. There is also java script on the website which we use for tracking visitors like GA. I wonder what's the reason for this alert? We believe its due to the Java script. Do you think meta descriptions will harm this bad? Any ideas? Thanks
Search Behavior | | vtmoz0 -
Google Analytics Segments - Can't find location
Hi all, I am trying to set up a Google Analytics segment with the location as 'Kurdistan'. I have tried all location groupings (city, region etc) and am unable to locate it. Anyone else not able to locate it? Or does anyone know why I can't? Thanks,
Search Behavior | | Davinia22
Davinia0 -
Would you say it is more bennificial to seperate keywords in the title tag tag of a page using a common ( keyword , keyword | Domain.com) or using a hyphen as SEOmoz best practices reccommends (keyword - keyword | domain.com)?
Title tag best practices according to seomoz is the following keyowrd - keyword | brand.com but I have seen some interesting results from using a comma as to a hyphen to seperate keywords as reccomended and wanted to know which method is more crawler friendly.
Search Behavior | | JHSpecialty0 -
Home page (s) deindexed
Ok odd one. 2 sites hosted on go daddy, neither sites has any cause for concern. But both sites have had there home pages deindexed or - 10000 penalty for no reason. We do the SEO for 1 site and not for the other. The server is shared with go daddy no idea on how many other 3rd party sites are on it. I've filed a reinclusion request for both sites. Any help is more than welcome.
Search Behavior | | therealmarkhall0 -
What is the best way of tracking direct traffic coming from print ads?
I have numerous print ads running and I would like to see which ads are sending traffic to my site. What is the best way of doing this? Redirects? Is this a recommended practice? Thanks!
Search Behavior | | Lael0 -
Drastic Fluctuation in Site Rankings
All, Hope you are having a good day! Recently I had a strange issue with one of my site and I am not sure what might have caused it. I am sure this would be a good place to discuss about it and get some feedback from the elite people in the industry. Here is the problem. Last weekend (On sunday noon) my site which was ranking on Page 1 suddenly dropped its ranking for its main keywords to nowhere, I was panicked to see what was happening and by the end of the day it was slowly coming back and by next morning everything was back. Again on Wednesday noon, the same thing happened. However, this time it din't come up by the next morning. Making it worse, all of my keyword rankings went down from good spots to no where and there was a point when I could no longer see my site. I was worried something might have happened this time and was not sure what could the reason be. On Friday afternoon all the ranking came up better than the previous (which is a very good news for me). At the moment, my site is doing very well and I am really happy about it. I did realize that Google was updating their Algorithm, but this behavior is the strangest I have seen over years. Can someone enlighten me on this peculiar behavior. Is there something wrong with my site or is it a common thing that I have never noticed? I have never done anything blackhat for the site. To be honest, all I have done is some low level link building on the site and the site had some advantage of a re-direct from one my previous site which was doing very well in search engines (I changed it to take advantage of the new domain I had). Your opinions/suggestions are a appreciated.
Search Behavior | | frostmill0