What’s Better For SEO Mobile Design Or Responsive Design

In today’s world, having a website which works perfectly only on a desktop is just not enough. Most internet users are using their smart phones or tablets to go online and want everything on the go. We can present ourselves in front of our customers on their mobile and tablet by making a mobile design or a responsive design website. What’s better for Search Engine Optimization and what should you use?

According to Wikipedia, a responsive site is as follows: “Responsive Web design (RWD) is a Web design approach aimed at crafting sites to provide an optimal viewing experience, easy reading and navigation with a minimum of resizing, panning, and scrolling, across a wide range of devices.”

On the other hand, a mobile design website is where you create a lighter version of your desktop website. Essentially you are taking anything unnecessary out and it can be easily read on a smaller screen mobile device or tablet.

According to Matt Cutts the Head of Google’s Web-spam team who recently addressed this specific question, he said; both ways are correct if done properly. However, responsive design is the smarter option out of the two. He said that the SEO value with in responsive design is a smarter way to go because you can come across many issues while creating a mobile version of your website. Issues such as redirection on wrong pages, non- friendly redirection, and not using non-canonical are the common mistakes people make in creating a mobile version of a website. Matt Cutts video on Youtube this issue (youtube.com/watch?v=D03wRb4s7MU)

Easier To Maintain One Site vs. Many

Having a design which automatically responds according to the device that is being used is a better option in comparison to a mobile version. For example: if you want some changes in your website, you have to make those changes in both versions. If you have a responsive website, you can make changes and it stays constant throughout.

No Canonical, Link Juice & Page Authority Issue:

Responsive designs don’t have a URL canonical issue. You don’t have to worry about it and there is no risk of page rank, link juice or other SEO factors which will get divided on both the URL’s.

No Worries about Redirection

You don’t have to worry about redirection mistakes like redirecting to the wrong URL, redirection not working and also not using the canonical tags.

Easy Content Management

It is easy with responsive design for you to have only one set of content to manage instead of multiple pages on multiple domains. As a result, this makes it simpler to manage content on your website.

Ultimately the choice is yours if you want a mobile or a responsive design website. Many of our clients at Mind Digital Group go with a responsive design website versus a mobile site. Even our own company website is responsive instead of mobile. If you need any advice, guidance or help in building a responsive or mobile site please feel free to get in touch with the team at Mind Digital Group. We would be more than happy to help!