Responsive vs Adaptive vs Mobile site

There has been lot of talks on whether your mobile version of your site should be responsive ,Adaptive or it should be a separate mobile site.The process of developing each of these type is different and also each has its own pros and cons.Most of the companies are now moving towards a separate mobile site due to growing user base on mobile .However responsive and adaptive still have decent number of user.

Responsive site and Adaptive: In responsive design layout changes with change in screen size which in adaptive design layout change only at particular screen size.Both are easy to maintain but complex to build because of adjusting the desktop layout to the mobile  size

Mobile site:Difficult to maintain but easy to build since it is not dependent on desktop design so more flexibility to built.

                    In this blog I would discuss how to decide which one should you go for in order to achieve better results.

1.Device resolution 

Check what are different resolution through which your user access your site through different device.Can they be clustered in a 3-4 groups in which 99% of user base fall.If this is the case then adaptive site makes more sense in case it is more than responsive site is better.

2.Identify the goal of your site:

What your site is about?Is it a transaction site ,navigation site or informational site.In case it is informational site it is better to go with responsive or adaptive site since the site is predominantly content oriented which can be easily shown using responsive and adaptive orientation.In case it is transnational site then it makes more sense to go with mobile site because of complex navigation and functionality

3. Bounce rates and conversion on mobile

Check how good your site performing on mobile in terms of bounce and conversion if it is comparable to desktop then it means you can go for responsive or adaptive if it  less than it better to go for mobile site

4.Traffic projection on mobile

When the traffic on mobile is outgrowing desktop then it is better to concentrate your effort more on mobile than on desktop.In this case  mobile site is better than responsive or adaptive since it provides more flexibility

5.Conversion and Cost trade off

You should do how much conversion will improve with the increase in cost and if it is not more than better to go with responsive or adaptive site

The final decision should be taken by analyzing how your site fares on the above  points.

Common issues in SEO and how to resolve them

One of the most challenging component of SEO is technical SEO. There are lot of technical issues which comes up when one manages SEO. These technical issue sometimes can lead to drastic drop in rank of the page and so one needs to be aware of how to fix these issues.

In this blog I will discuss some of the major issues in SEO

1. Wrong  page cache issue.

This issue is basically about wrong page getting cached for a URL.This means that when one searches in google and clicks on a URL he lands on to the page that does not match with the URL shown on search results.This issue may arises because of wrong canonical which means that wrong page has been set as the original page for the URL.When google bot crawls the wrong page get cached and because of which in search it get redirected to wrong page.

In order to fix such issues one should follow the below process

1.Go to the Webmaster account

2.Go to the Remove URL feature which is under crawl section

3.In this enter the URL which is being redirected to the wrong page.Now there will be three option 

• Remove the URL from search and Cache
• Remove from cache only
• Temporarily hide directory

Chose "Remove from cache only".This will remove the wrong cached page and when Google crawls the URL next time it will crawl the right page.

2.Google not crawling page

There can be various reason why google is not crawling your page.

No Interlinking:When page is not interlinked from any page google cannot find it and hence does not crawl.Ensure that page is interlinked from other pages

Bot limit:There is limit on the number of bytes that Bot crawls so if the there are number of pages then there are chances that google does not crawl some pages.In this case mention all your page in sitemap in the order of importance

Password protected:When any page is password protected bot will not crawl that page.

Robot.txt file: Check the robot txt file.Ensure that it is not blocking the page you want to crawl

3.Page not getting indexed

One may face problems like the page is not getting indexed.This issue happens mainly when the google is not able to navigate to your page.In order to resolve this one should ensure that the page is linked from some other page of the site.The will not only help in easy navigation to the page but also boost the crawling frequency of the page.

Mobile content optimzation

Traffic on mobile web and APP is increasing continuously because of increased mobile usage by people.There are lot advantage which mobile provides to user some of them are access on the go,easy share options,etc.However,developing a mobile site/APP is challenging because of limited space.In order to make your mobile site/APP efficient it is critical that right content is put on it so that space is properly utilized and user goals are also met.

                                                              In this blog will look at various factors which one should consider while deciding the content to be put on mobile site.

Click Map

Click map of your desktop providing a vital information on which feature/section user is currently using and the trends.This can help you in deciding which feature/section to be put on your mobile site.Higher the clicks, more useful is that section to the user  and so those feature should be introduced on mobile.

Call to action usage

Call to action button are the one which user uses to make transaction on the site.Desktop can have many call to action button.However all the buttons may not be useful for mobile and also because of  limited space one cannot put all the button on mobile.The usage of different button should be analyzed and only the prominent action button should be introduced.

Exclusive mobile features

There are many features which can be used only on mobile such as call ,location tracking(GPS) etc.. on Mobile.The relevancy of these features for site should be analyzed and whichever is applicable should be introduced.    

                       

Technical SEO-Different types

SEO has three main components which are On-Page optimization,Off-Page optimization and Technical SEO. On-Page optimization is more about optimizing Meta data such as Title,Description,Tags,URL so that google understands what keyword site is targeting .Most of the people are aware of On-Page optimization. Off-Page optimization is more about building links to the site from external platforms such as blogs,related site etc.This is also widely used and most of them are aware of this part of SEO.
                                         Technical SEO involves more about technology and how technology can be used efficiently to improve SEO. Below are some of the major Technical SEO

Schema:

This is basically about adding main parameters in a particular format which google understand and these are shown on the google search result pages as separate links.It is basically about structured data.The various schema  for different sectors are available here. Schema help in showing most important parameters on the search results.For ex you are searching for a movie ,the search results may show you directors,producer,actors,duration etc for the movie if the data is organised in schema format

Dynamic Meta tools

The meta data such as Title,Description can be changed without editing the code using meta data tools.These tools can be created in house or it can be bought and can help in updating the meta whenever it is required without involving the development team.

HTML sitemap

Sitemap is basically the structure of the site which tells bot what are the different pages which are there on the website and how it can be accessed.In webmaster one can submit XML sitemap which google uses to crawl your site.However,one can also create HTML sitemap which can be integrated on your site when google crawl the site sitemap also get crawled.It is easy for the google to understand HTML sitemap.The can help in improving crawl effectiveness of the site.

Technical error fixes

SEO person also need to fix various errors which are displayed in google webmaster.Some of the most common issues are crawl errors.

Goals using virtual urls in Google analytics

Goals in google analytics helps in understanding navigation on the website.Goals in google analytics can be created only when there is a certain pattern in URL for similar pages.However,sometimes it may not be possible to  have URL with pattern in that case it become very difficult to create goals.

                                    Virtual URLs can help when the page URLs do not follow a pattern.Virtual URLs are nothing but customized URL for the same page.For example you have product detail page with many URL now you want to group these URLs into a single URL so that you can use in the goals.

How to create virtual URL

For this create a separate view in google analytics with virtual URLs.When user uses these particular pages the tracking get stored in the virtual URL views.The virtual pages can be seen under the behavior->site content->all pages.Below is the virtual URL shown on google analytics

How to create Goal using virtual URL

To create goals first identify the corresponding virtual URL for the page.These can be done by adding secondary dimension page URL against each virtual page. After identifying the corresponding virtual page URLs for each page type which needs to be added in the goal,the virtual pages can be added in the goal as below

Once these goals are create now it can be used to understand the navigation of the user on the site.Virtual Pages should be created in separate views in order to avoid any kind of tracking issue in the normal view
                                                   

List view vs Grid view

Every internet user have come across grid view and list view across various portal.These are the two most commonly used view for the listings.Many site have both views in which user is allowed to toggle between them based on his requirement.
                                                      Each  view has its own advantage and disadvantage.In this blog will discuss on the advantage and disadvantage of these views

List view

What is List view

This view follow single column layout which  means that only one product is displayed in one row.

When to use list view

List view should be used when

• Lot of information has to been shown to the user in order to allow him to make right decision.This is applicable for high involvement products such as cars,property when the number of information points which user looks for is more .
• You want user to respond from the same page instead of going to the detail page of the product.
• There are lot of call to action for the list which is difficult to accommodate on the normal grid view

Advantage of list view

• More flexibility:Since the space available is more it gives more flexibility on what information can be displayed
• Limited space:In mobile where there is limited space list view is more comfortable

Disadvantage of list view

• More scrolls:User has to scroll more compared to Grid view to see same number of listings.
• Not easy to compare:Since user can see only one list it become difficult for user to compare different products side by side

Grid view

What is Grid view

This view follows multi column layout i.e in a single row multiple products can be displayed
 simultaneously

When to use Grid view

• Limited information:This should be used when limited information is enough for user to make decision.This is more applicable in variety seeking industry such as eCommerce , retail when user does not go more in depth to make decision
• Compare is important:When you want user to compare the listing side by side in order to make decision this should be shown

Advantage of Grid view

• More list with less scroll:User can see more product at a time so less scrolls is required.
• Better conversion:This may increase conversion since more option is shown to the user

Disadvantage of Grid view

Limited flexibility: Since the space is constraint the amount of option available is limited .

What leads to increase in bounce rate?

Bounce rate is very important metrics for any site.It is one of the factors which helps in measuring user experience .When bounce rate increases it means more people are exiting your site without navigating to  other page.Increase in bounce can negatively impact conversion of your site.However,there are instances when the bounce rate increase but the conversion of your site has not dropped.
                                              In terms of google bounce is when the user exit your site without navigating to even one page of your site.The change in navigation of your site can impact the bounce rate of the site.The various scenario when bounce rate can increase

1.Removal of navigation links:

When the page is revamped ,there are chances that some of the links on the site which user used to clicks were removed.The removal of links can increase the bounce rate.Therefore before removing any links its clicks should be analyzed before taking a decision of removing the link

2.Change in interaction of site:

The change in site interaction may reduce the page navigation of site.For eg. before when click on photos if user is taken on page and now if he is navigated to a popup  then Google does not regard it as page navigation which increase bounce rate but is  not actually a bounce.In order to ascertain this the navigation should be changed to check the impact on bounce rate

3.Decrease in richness of information

When the information shown in site is not enough for user to make decision it will leads to increase in bounce rate.For eg..In one of pages price which is an important paramater was not displayed for many properties due to which bounce was high.When the price was updated for the properties it led to significant decrease in the bounce rate and also led to improvement in conversion of the page

Before concluding anything from bounce rate once should analyze the reason behind increase in bounce rate and based on that appropriate action should be taken.

4.Mismatch between user expectation and landing page

When the user is landing to a page which does meet the need of user it leads to increase in bounce rate..In generally happens in case of display traffic when the intent of user is clearly not known.