mastering mobile seo for your website and native app content

Mastering Mobile SEO for Your Website & Native App

[WEBINAR]

Housekeeping

• Audience will be put on mute during the webinar

• Type in your questions at anytime

• Q&A session at the end

Agenda● The Broken App Content Discovery from Search

● Strategies to Maximize SEO Value for Your App

○ Google App Indexing ○ AMP& AMP Deepviews○ Instant Apps

● Mobile SEO Best Practices for Your Website

● Optimize the Web-to-App Flow to Maximize ROI

About the Speakers

Alex Austin CEO and co-founderApp Developer

Emily GrossmanDirector of App StrategyFrequent speaker at mobile marketing conferences

@illustriousalex @goutaste

The Importance of SEO

10x conversion rate from

organic SEO traffic than paid traffic

51% web traffic driven by

organic search

Native App Crushes Mobile Web

3x Conversion rate than the mobile

web

55% of all US

e-commerce transactions

Your App

Your app’s content

A potential new user

App Content Trapped

Your App

Your app’s content

A potential new user

The Way It Should Be

Google (Firebase) App Indexing?

not quite

Google (Firebase) App Indexing

Website(or Branch link)



Your App

app indexing



Your App

app indexing

tracking lost

You need a website still.

Don’t have one?

App content sitemaps withAMP Deepviews for search

Branch automatically indexes your app content & creates a de-duped sitemap hosted on your app.link domain to expose your content to search.

Organic Search with Deepview Discovery Flow

DEEP LINKED CONTENTORGANIC SEARCH BRANCH DEEPVIEW APP / PLAY STORE

Ranking still mostly based on traditional non-app signals

(back links, social engagement, mobile

optimized, etc)

Still need to work on SEO but Branch makes that easy

Have a website?

Mobile Web SEO Best Practices

Why Is Mobile Web SEO Important If You Have a Native App?

@goutasteEmily GrossmanMobileMoxie

1. For Google App Indexing, Signals From App AND Web Contribute to Rankings


2. Better Mobile Web SEO Helps You Drive More App Installs


How is Mobile SEO Different from Desktop SEO?


Site Architecture

Has SEO Implications

Websites & Apps Can

Co-Mingle in the Same

Results

Queries & Query Intent

Can Be Different

Quality Signals Can Be Different for Mobile Use Cases

Voice Search = More

Natural-Language Based

Queries

Results Change from

Device to Device

Competing for Less

Above-the-Fold Space in

SERPs

Rankings Tracking for Mobile SEO is Hard and Getting Harder…

Today’s Tips for Improving Your Mobile Web SEO:

❑ Pass Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test

❑ Improve Mobile Usability

❑ Prepare for Mobile Indexing

❑ Assess Mobile Site Architecture

❑ Assess Content Parity

❑ Leverage Schema Markup (Especially in High-Interest Verticals)

❑ Improve Performance (PageSpeed)

❑ AMP

❑ PWAs


bit.ly/mobilefriendlytest


Improve Mobile Usability

Remove FlashConfigure ViewPorts

Tt!

Use Legible Font Size

Space Out Touch Elements

Search Console Mobile Usability Report: support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6101188?hl=en


Preparing for Mobile-First Indexing (The TL;DR Version)

Desktop Only (1 URL)

Responsive Design(1 URL)

M. Site(2 URLs)

Dynamic Serving(1 URL)

✓ Your desktop site will still be used (not ideal)





M. Site(2 URLs)


✓ Not much changes✓ Allow Crawling of CSS,

JS, & Images






M. Site(2 URLs)



JS, & Images


✓ Allow Crawling of CSS, JS, & Images

✓ Support Structured Data✓ Check html for hreflang, & add

to mobile html if needed





M. Site(2 URLs)



JS, & Images



✓ Support Structured Data✓ Support hreflang on m URLs✓ Mobile URL sitemap✓ + More…


✓ Support Structured Data✓ Check html for hreflang, & add

to mobile html if needed


Preparing for Mobile-First Indexing (The Extended Edition)

https://www.mobilemoxie.com/blog/app-seo-news/understanding-mobile-first-indexing-23-long-term-impact-seo/

https://www.mobilemoxie.com/blog/app-seo-news/understanding-mobile-first-indexing-13-immediate-impact-seo/


Structured Data Makes Mobile Search Results More Clickable


Structured Data in Mobile Search

@goutastehttps://developers.google.com/search/docs/data-types/data-type-selector

Get Better at Being a Data Source: Structured Data Formatting

moz.com/blog/json-ld-for-beginners

@goutaste

Performance & Site Speed – Key to Driving Traffic That Stays On-Site


Desktop Performance Matters For SEO; Mobile Performance Matters More



Graph by @lukew

Improving Performance (With An Emphasis on Mobile-Specific Pain Points)

❑ Avoid Redirects (especially with multiple hops)

❑ Optimize Images❑ Enable Compression❑ Use Sprites to minimize Round Trip

Image Requests❑ Minify CSS, JS, HTML❑ Leverage Browser Caching

❑ Reduce Server Response Time❑ Leverage Critical Path Rendering to

minimize impact of render-blocking assets

❑ Pre-fetch & Pre-Render Most Important Assets

❑ HTTP/2 (requires HTTPS to really be effective)

❑ Support Service Workers (more on this later…)

The Basics More Advanced


testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.comtestmysite.thinkwithgoogle.co

mtestmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com

testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com


Improving Performance:Tools You Can

Use



webpagetest.org


Improving Performance:Tools You Can

Use



moz.com/blog/the-technical-seo-renaissance

Improving Performance:Tools You Can Use

@goutaste



New Chrome Dev Tools Features


New Technologies to Improve Mobile Web Performance: AMP & PWA


What Is AMP?• Framework for speed• Built for static content

• Think News, Recipes

• On Google, leverages a Google Cache• Caveat(s):

• Site traffic all on Google cache & inaccurate attribution

• AMPs are treated as “alternates” ■ When a webpage has two alternates

(AMP & deep link), Google serves AMP (not the deep link)


Progressive Web Apps & The Power of Service Workers

HTTPS REQUIRED

Since Service Workers are so powerful, browsers won't support one without encryption


Capture the Mobile Web Visitor to Install Your App

Website Popularity Drives Native App Popularity

Enter: the gradual upsell

GET

Get the app now!

My app is disrupting apps

My app is disrupting apps

Or subject yourself to a terrible, laggy user

experience on our site.

Works well, legally…

Works well, legally…

for now.

Journeys: Targeted Web to App Flows

Drive high-quality installs and purchases from your mobile web traffic

1. Target2. Design3. Deploy

Organic Search Audience with Gradual Upsell

ORGANIC SEARCH LIGHT BANNER FULL INTERSTITIAL

Book in app

It’s much easier to browser this property

in the iOS app.

continue on web

Social Flow With Interstitial

Facebook feed link Facebook browser

Book in app

It’s much easier to browser this property

in the iOS app.

continue on web

Social Flow With Interstitial with Branch Data

Facebook feed link Facebook browser

Open App

We saw you already have the app

installed.

continue on web

Coming soon: Instant Apps

Android Instant Apps / App Streaming

Your App

Instant App

Android Instant Apps / App Streaming

Your App

Instant App


?

SEO strategy impact likely minimal?

KEY TAKEAWAYS 1

If you’re app-only:● You’ll need to build website for SEO

● Use Branch hosted Deepviews for your website until you build one

If you have an app & a website:● Make sure your mobile website passes Google’s Mobile Friendly test

● Optimize for Usability, SERP features, and Speed

● Make sure you have a mechanism to drive web traffic to your app, a

channel you have full control with

For driving app installs from your site:● No full page interstitials on Google referrers

● Use gradual upsell from Google

● Full page interstitials fine for other referrers (social, etc)

● Use Branch data to customize the experience

KEY TAKEAWAYS 2

There’s never been a more exciting time to be in mobile

Just Keep Building.

Alex Austin@illustriousalex

branch.io

Emily Grossman@goutaste

mobilemoxie.com

Q&A

mastering mobile seo for your website and native app content

Marketing