“More Than Half of Google’s UK Searches are made via Mobile”
London Technology Week is taking place this week (15-21 June), and its series of events aims to bring together all the big guns from the capitals tech scene, including Google, Amazon and more.
In the official launch event, Eileen Naughton, who is the Managing Director and VP for Sales and Operations for Google in the UK and Ireland, made an interesting announcement during her speech, revealing that more than half of all UK searches are being made via mobile, with more than half of YouTube searches also coming via mobiles.
While this may not seem like a huge revelation at first – especially when you consider that Google announced via their Adwords Blog in May that there are ten countries where mobile searches are outnumbering desktop searches – it is worth noting that Google have been reluctant to reveal the names of the ten locations (although the US and Japan were confirmed as two of them).
Billions of times per day, consumers turn to Google for I want-to-know, I want-to-go, I want-to-do, and I want-to-buy moments. And at these times, consumers are increasingly picking up their smartphones for answers. In fact, more Google searches take place on mobile devices than on computers in 10 countries including the US and Japan. This presents a tremendous opportunity for marketers to reach people throughout all the new touchpoints of a consumer’s path to purchase.
For UK businesses who are invested in SEO and PPC, and are already invested in making their website more mobile-friendly, getting this announcement on record is a big deal. Speculation plays a huge part in trying to get the best out of Google, so the knowledge that search engine and YouTube searches via smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices have now passed the 50% mark is likely to have an effect on many businesses marketing strategies.
What can we take away from this announcement?
In short, this announcement shows that you need to ensure that your website is mobile-ready, and that you should definitely consider video marketing as part of your digital marketing strategy. With so many searches being made via YouTube, you should be looking to have at least one video available to potential customers, even if it is just an introductory video to your products and services.
If you read our blog post from April 21st on mobile algorithm updates, you’ll see a host of ways to prepare your website for Google’s Mobile-Friendly algorithm update, which includes ensuring that your website is fully-responsive (so that it works on any device) and conducting a mobile-friendly test via your Webmaster Tools account.
It is important that you don’t put all of your eggs in one basket though. Whilst mobile searches are rising with every passing year, businesses need to remember that around 45% of traffic is still coming via laptops and desktops and these figures can change based on the industry and niche being searched, and of course social media, content marketing and local SEO are still integral parts of your marketing strategy that you need to be 100% committed to.
