While many big brands are retooling to be mobile-friendly to retain high Google mobile search rankings ahead of the big search engine?s algorithm changes starting in two weeks, the tweaking will catch a number of marketers off guard, especially those with multiple or neglected Web properties.

Google?s move to factor mobile friendliness into its mobile search rankings beginning April 21 means that marketers with sites that fail to render an easy-to-navigate experience on mobile may lose their top placement in Google?s search results. The implication could be a large amount of traffic loss as some sites show roughly 50 percent or greater skew towards mobile traffic. 

?We predict marketers will take it seriously, and most already do, but Google?s mobile algorithm will only be a catalyst for brands who are not up to par,? said Michael Dobbs, vice president of search engine optimization at 360i, a New York-based digital marketing agency.

?Their Web analytics will spark their compliance if this update impacts free traffic. Most smart marketers and large brands that are active in digital already realize the importance of providing a great mobile experience,? he said. ?They have the data and analytics to prove the percentage of existing customers who are entering via mobile devices.?

When it announced the changes early this year, Google said Web masters could improve their sites? rankings by creating high-quality sites that users would want to use and share. Pages with say, small text or elements that are too close together, would see rankings suffer.

?This means marketers should be on their toes, poised to manage any upsets in organic traffic, said Brandon Schakola, group director for earned media and strategy with The Search Agency, an online ad agency based in Los Angeles. ?Paid search budgets might have to shift to cover any large disturbances to temporarily balance any major losses.?

Brands such as Adidas, Rimmel London, Nike and Chobani, which already have great mobile strategies supported by mobile-friendly Web sites and targeted mobile campaigns, are well-positioned for the changes.

 

Those lacking Google-optimized or mobile-optimized properties or campaigns, however, will lose out; not just in terms of Google?s search ranking but in potential ways to connect with consumers who increasingly search for, compare, purchase, review or recommend products and services using smartphones. 

In Searchmetrics? list of the top 100 ranking domains and error types of sites that suffer against Google?s Mobile-Friendly Testing Tool, 80 percent of analyzed pages spit out a mobile-friendly label. 

?It is difficult to tell who is taking steps to comply with the current tools available, as Google announced this upcoming update back in mid-January,? Mr. Schakola said. ?Usually companies have their development queues full by this time of year, and it will be difficult for many to get approvals to pivot and drop or reprioritize projects. 

?Unfortunately for most, this will be a rude awakening for having accumulated a technical debt by putting off prioritizing mobile.?

For online retailers and especially mid-market online pure-plays, a low Google ranking could mean the difference between success and failure. 

Since the rankings are done page by page, one substandard page on a domain would be unlikely to inflict suffering on an entire site. Yet, the implications could be significant if a large number of pages failed to pass Google?s benchmarks.

 

?Depending on a brand?s vertical, be it travel, retail, finance, B2B, CPG or  entertainment, the search volume via mobile queries can be more or less significant,? Mr. Dobbs said. ?Regardless, mobile is still impacting all of these vertical as users adopt more mobile devices. And, ranking in mobile results will only become more important year over year. 

?So, a hotel brand who does not host mobile friendly pages, providing a poor user experience, will likely suffer greatly when this update occurs. A majority of search visitors are entering via mobile devices on hotel Web sites.

 

?In short, [for] brands driving a lot of business and revenue via mobile search, but also lagging in mobile user experience, their bottom line is very likely to be impacted.?

 

Google will have to do a better job of educating the benefits of the potential changes in its algorithm and how it could benefit digital marketers.

?In the end, Google is an advertising platform company and its success depends upon the success of its digital marketing customers,? said Neil Shah, research director for devices and ecosystems with Counterpoint, a technology market research firm.

Google, Mountain View, CA, did not respond to media inquiries.

 

A sidebar to the story is that while the algorithm changes focus on mobile-friendly Web site optimization, it could be an incentive for some players, such as the Ecommerce giant Flipkart, to push ahead with plans to shut down mobile Web sites and divert all Web traffic to a mobile application. 

?This is an interesting trend to drive app usage and offer much better faster and native shopping experience to the users,? Mr. Shah said. ?Also it means the company doesn?t have to maintain two properties, that is, a mobile Web site as well as mobile apps, which means a lot of cost and time savings.?

Ultimately, brands that are closest to their customers will win.

?With mobile searches exceeding desktop searches, Google is simply responding to consumer demand by nudging brands in a direction that most have been heading toward for quite some time now,? said Zachary Allen of Method Communications, a PR firm headquartered in Salt Lake City, UT.

Many marketers have already prioritized mobile, based on the increase in usage over the last 12 months. Much of what brands have already done to meet the needs of their growing mobile user base will only benefit them when the mobile-friendly algorithm rolls out in a few weeks.

?Given that Google search remains the most popular search engine on smartphones,  marketers would be crazy to ignore any changes made to optimize for mobile, especially with many businesses seeing continued growth in traffic from mobile,? said Nitesh Patel, director of wireless media strategies for Newton, MA-based Strategy Analytics.

?While optimizing for mobile makes sense, desktop also remains important, and a divergent approach for mobile and desktop search will create challenges for marketers across two separate screens.?

Michael Barris is staff reporter on Mobile Marketer, New York