Getting More Traffic for Your Mobile Site: A Mix of Content, SEO and Social Media

Exploit the Limitations of Mobile Devices

When you are using a mobile device, be it a tablet or a smartphone, one of the biggest disadvantages is the lack of a full-sized keyboard to help you input text. Either using a QWERTY mini-sized keyboard or tapping your way on the screen, the experience is much more difficult and much slower than if you use a desktop computer.

And this is mainly the reason why you should optimize your mobile site differently. The added difficult in text input for mobile devices gives rise to three possibilities:

1. The use of voice search.

Instead of tapping away on a screen, people would find it easier just to speak into their smartphones and dictate a keyword. We are seeing a lot of devices with software and apps that allow for voice-activated search. Google search on Android devices and Apple's SIRI comes at the top of the list.

People using voice search are more likely to speak in longer phrases or in complete sentences, and less likely to just limit themselves to traditional search terms. So, whereas a desktop computer user would be typing in the search terms, "sweetest oranges in California," a voice-assisted search term would be more like "Where do you buy the sweetest oranges in California?"

2. The rise of shorter keywords.

But not everybody is going to use that voice feature, especially those that are using feature phones instead of smartphones to access the Internet. So on top of aiming for long keywords, mobile website owners are also advised to target shorter keywords. Instead of "sweetest oranges in California," most people will only have the patience to type "best oranges CA."

Look for keywords that need less taps or input.

3. The use of image search.

There are also apps and services that allow people to search just by snapping a photo of the thing that they want to search. Imagine people visiting a famous landmark in your city. If they want to learn more about that landmark, they could simply take a photo using the Google Goggles app and it will automatically run a search.

To take advantage of this, you must make sure that you optimize your images, especially if you have a physical location for your store. You should also have a photo catalog of your products. This way, if somebody finds your store or your products interesting, and they decided to learn more about you, your mobile site would be one of the things that they would see.

The Rise of Location-Aware Searches

Aside from the relatively more difficult text input on mobile devices, you could also expect that local search results are a little different. Because mobile devices may be geo-located, Google could easily serve localized search results. So make sure that your mobile site has pages that target keywords with your specific location on it.

Understand the Mobile Crowd: Getting More Traffic

Its very crucial that you know who your target market is before you could come up with a successful marketing and sales plan, and your mobile efforts are no exception.

1. Profiling

The adoption of mobile Internet is not for everybody. You should first see if your industry has consumers who are more technologically skilled than the average people. For example, those who want updated news and current events and those who are interested in the latest gadgets are more inclined to use mobile Internet. Are these people your target audience?

You should tailor your mobile site content according to who your market is and what they like.

2. Immediate demand

Internet access via mobile devices is popular because it serves a purpose: the delivery of information on demand anytime, anywhere. Take advantage of this by giving your mobile visitors fresh deals and new content. Give them something that would make them click on your site when they see you on the search results.

3. Mobile is social, well, most of the time.

Nine out of ten mobile Internet users go to social networking sites, such as Twitter and Facebook. If you want more traffic, then you should have a strong social media presence. More than this, you should make your mobile site pages easier to share on social media sites.

Putting all these together should not only give you a solid foothold on which to enhance your mobile sites presence and exposure, but also expand its user functionality.

This post is brought to you by SEO Inc, a Search Engine Optimization Company located in Southern California.

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