Google's list of mobile URL's

[ezinaz]

1. Froogle - www.froogle.com/m (http://www.froogle.com/m)
2. Google - www.google.com/m (http://www.google.com/m)
3. Gmail - www.gmail.com/m (http://www.gmail.com/m)
4. G Reader - www.google.com/reader/m (http://www.google.com/reader/m)
5. iGoogle (formerly Personalised Home) - www.google.com/m (http://www.google.com/m)
6. Google Voice Local Search - 1-800-GOOG-411
7. Google Maps Mobile - www.google.com/gmm (http://www.google.com/gmm)


C'mon, Google, this is getting to be ridiculous. ...use frieking google.mobi already!

This list of URL's is from an interesting article discussing google's phone capabilities.
http://symbianguru.typepad.com/welcome/2007/05/the_googlephone.html

How are Googler's supposed to keep track of all these different URL's?

[Andres Kello]

C'mon, Google, this is getting to be ridiculous. ...use frieking google.mobi already!

This list of URL's is from an interesting article discussing google's phone capabilities.
http://symbianguru.typepad.com/welcome/2007/05/the_googlephone.html

How are Googler's supposed to keep track of all these different URL's?Here's an idea. Why doesn't someone literally call up Google (or e-mail them) and directly ask "Why aren't you advertising Google.mobi if you're a sponsor of mTLD?" and then report back?

Anyone up for the task?

[ezinaz]

Here's an idea. Why doesn't someone literally call up Google (or e-mail them) and directly ask "Why aren't you advertising Google.mobi if you're a sponsor of mTLD?" and then report back?

Anyone up for the task?

I'm working on this right now, Andres. I will let you know what I find out.

[Andres Kello]

I'm working on this right now, Andres. I will let you know what I find out.Thanks a lot, ezinaz, I'm sure a lot of members here would like to know the answer.

[ezinaz]

Interestingly enough, I found this VERY interesting blog thread, that contains comments from:
1) a .mobi detractor
2) Ronan Cremin, Director of Developer Initiatives at dotMobi
3) James Pearce, CTO at dotMobi
4) Sean Owen, Google insider working on mobile local search

Blog URL: http://natalian.org/archives/2007/05/26/mobile-web-3/

Sean Owen provides a brilliant and staunch defense of .mobi. I have e-mailed him and asked him questions about if google plans to promote their mobile offerings under the .mobi banner. I've also invited him to our community...

[Andres Kello]

Interestingly enough, I found this VERY interesting blog thread, that contains comments from:
1) a .mobi detractor
2) Ronan Cremin, Director of Developer Initiatives at dotMobi
3) James Pearce, CTO at dotMobi
4) Sean Owen, Google insider working on mobile local search

Blog URL: http://natalian.org/archives/2007/05/26/mobile-web-3/

Sean Owen provides a brilliant and staunch defense of .mobi. I have e-mailed him and asked him questions about if google plans to promote their mobile offerings under the .mobi banner. I've also invited him to our community...Fascinating discussion, thanks for the good read. Sean Owen seems like the perfect person to contact at Google.

[Gerry]

http://technologyreview.com/images/mobile_promo.jpg (http://technologyreview.com/mobile/)

Technology Review is now mobile! (http://technologyreview.com/mobile/) Get the latest technology news and cutting-edge stories at mobile.technologyreview.com


Here's another that makes no sense. I just described to TECHNOLOGY REVIEW which is published by, of all people, MIT.

Needless to say, I have already contacted them to inquire and hopefully educate how is it possible that one of the leading technological institutions on the planet is not aware of or using .mobi.

Here's their pitch:

Technology Review, the authority on the future of technology, introduces cutting-edge content formatted for your mobile device. With streamlined navigation and audio versions of daily stories, you’re never far away from the latest technology news and in-depth analysis.

[GijsZePa]

Sean Owen provides a brilliant and staunch defense of .mobi. I have e-mailed him and asked him questions about if google plans to promote their mobile offerings under the .mobi banner. I've also invited him to our community...

This is the way !! Nice work ezinaz. Hopefully you will receive some feedback and it will be very interesting to hear what google's plans are with the .mobi extionsion.

Martin

[srowen]

Hi guys, and here I am. I can maybe provide some informal comments on google.mobi. In general I see a trend away from product-specific domains like froogle.com and towards URLs under the google.X domain. So I imagine there will be more stuff under google.mobi, rather than froogle.mobi, etc. (Froogle's name is now "Google Product Search" BTW.)

There is an overall drive to unify search products together, as you see with Google "Universal" search on the desktop and our new mobile UI, which mixes different result types in results. So I think you're already seeing some convergence between search and iGoogle for example.

That leaves google.mobi. Right now it sends you to a page describing Google services. Maybe it's more intuitive to send that directly to search, since google.com is search. At this point it looks like the marketing guys prefer to use this entry point to advertise all services, which I can understand. At least you can always track down the service you want this way. Maybe it will all become structured more like google.com in the future; right now it's used a bit more as the analog of google.com/mobile, which is a marketing site. So we do use google.mobi really!

[ezinaz]

Hi guys, and here I am. I can maybe provide some informal comments on google.mobi. In general I see a trend away from product-specific domains like froogle.com and towards URLs under the google.X domain. So I imagine there will be more stuff under google.mobi, rather than froogle.mobi, etc. (Froogle's name is now "Google Product Search" BTW.)

There is an overall drive to unify search products together, as you see with Google "Universal" search on the desktop and our new mobile UI, which mixes different result types in results. So I think you're already seeing some convergence between search and iGoogle for example.

That leaves google.mobi. Right now it sends you to a page describing Google services. Maybe it's more intuitive to send that directly to search, since google.com is search. At this point it looks like the marketing guys prefer to use this entry point to advertise all services, which I can understand. At least you can always track down the service you want this way. Maybe it will all become structured more like google.com in the future; right now it's used a bit more as the analog of google.com/mobile, which is a marketing site. So we do use google.mobi really!

Hi Sean. Thanks for the great information!

Here's my follow-up question...

Does Google plan to actively market the google.mobi URL? One of the large knocks on dotMobi has been the perception that its backers (including Google) have not been adopting or promoting the TLD (whether this is perceived or actual).
You mentioned that the marketing team wants to keep it as a page pointing to various mobile services...and yet Google is still instructing users to "Go to http://mobile.google.com (http://mobile.google.com/)on your phone's browser by clicking the link or typing in the URL". This is the message that you see when you accessing "google.mobi" from a standard web browser, which then redirects to " http://www.google.com/mobile/ (http://www.google.com/mobile/)".

[Edited to remove comments that you answered in a previous post]

[pilot]

Sean, thanks for joining our forum! I'm sure that your insight here will be greatly appreciated by all. As a follow up question to ezinaz's point, it would be great if you could let us know of future marketing efforts when they go live instead of us having to search for them or hearing them on other forums. Is that possible?

Thanks


Hi guys, and here I am. I can maybe provide some informal comments on google.mobi. In general I see a trend away from product-specific domains like froogle.com and towards URLs under the google.X domain. So I imagine there will be more stuff under google.mobi, rather than froogle.mobi, etc. (Froogle's name is now "Google Product Search" BTW.)

There is an overall drive to unify search products together, as you see with Google "Universal" search on the desktop and our new mobile UI, which mixes different result types in results. So I think you're already seeing some convergence between search and iGoogle for example.

That leaves google.mobi. Right now it sends you to a page describing Google services. Maybe it's more intuitive to send that directly to search, since google.com is search. At this point it looks like the marketing guys prefer to use this entry point to advertise all services, which I can understand. At least you can always track down the service you want this way. Maybe it will all become structured more like google.com in the future; right now it's used a bit more as the analog of google.com/mobile, which is a marketing site. So we do use google.mobi really!

[srowen]

I see, good question. To paraphrase what I posted about a similar question in another thread. I think the focus is on a "Google" brand rather than any particular URL for accessing it. The reason google.com/mobile is favored may just be historical; that URL has been around for a while, and so the newer google.mobi is an alias for it essentially.

I personally like the shorter google.mobi URL as a pointer to learn about services, and will suggest that internally to anyone I know in marketing.

I think that whereas google.com (or .co.uk, etc.) is so associated with search that we must redirect that directly to search, google.mobi is viewed as a more general presence, an analog of the marketing site, which is a vital entry point to all mobile services, and I bet will be marketed where appropriate. But "Google = google.com = search" is so ingrained in everyone's mind, that it will probably still dominate as the primary URL for Google. That is I am not sure we'll see google.mobi redirect to search (then where do you learn about other services?) and therefore may not be the primary URL advertised. But, that's just my opinion and I don't even work in marketing.

Google's primary interest in .mobi, I believe, is in supporting their laudable efforts to lead, standardize, develop and promote the mobile web. "google.mobi" is kind of a secondary relationship with this TLD. We also have a strong interest in developing effective search for the mobile web, and as part of that, improving the quality and quantity of mobile web content out there. Our interests there align with .mobi's, and those of the users, and that's primarily why we support them and collaborate, rather than the google.mobi URL.

[srowen]

... to add a little more to this thought, I'd say we are definitely supporting the .mobi TLD in that we try to incorporate all .mobi sites into our index of mobile web pages. You should see .mobi results appear regularly with search results.

[srowen]

Sure, if I hear of marketing efforts concerning .mobi or google.mobi I'll try to remember to send around a heads up.

[Javier Marti]

As Sean has done, I think it would be a good PR exercise for Google to send someone from Marketing to also give us their take on this issue. Anyone has a contact for MKTG@Google or could you Sean fire up some internal emails inviting the relevant people over to this forum? I read your comments replying the blog post on this thread and it seems that you have quite a good handle of the technical issues regarding Google mobile.
It would be very interesting to get someone that can enlighten us on Google's future strategy from the commercial side of things. Mmmm...let me see....Eric Schmidt perhaps? ;)

[pcaero]

Hi guys, and here I am. I can maybe provide some informal comments on google.mobi. In general I see a trend away from product-specific domains like froogle.com and towards URLs under the google.X domain. So I imagine there will be more stuff under google.mobi, rather than froogle.mobi, etc. (Froogle's name is now "Google Product Search" BTW.)

There is an overall drive to unify search products together, as you see with Google "Universal" search on the desktop and our new mobile UI, which mixes different result types in results. So I think you're already seeing some convergence between search and iGoogle for example.

That leaves google.mobi. Right now it sends you to a page describing Google services. Maybe it's more intuitive to send that directly to search, since google.com is search. At this point it looks like the marketing guys prefer to use this entry point to advertise all services, which I can understand. At least you can always track down the service you want this way. Maybe it will all become structured more like google.com in the future; right now it's used a bit more as the analog of google.com/mobile, which is a marketing site. So we do use google.mobi really!


Thank you for the insite.
It is a pleasure to have you here..


pc

[Gerry]

Hi Sean.

In light of the fact that there is Google.de, .com, .cn, .jp, and nearly every thing under the sun...it would seem that google is well branded.

With the exception perhaps of the mobile market. Trends are pointing more and more to increased calls for IDN domains, native characters and scripts. I would imagine that the Marketing folks at Google are aware of this and prepping for that eventuality.

This is where .mobi steps in. With 250+ domain extensions in use today, more being introduced, there seems the need more than ever for a unifying extension...something to tie it all together.

With 3.5 billion cell phones in existence right now (twice the number of PC's) and an estimated 7 billion cell phones by 2010, Google.mobi can be the common thread between all these extensions, languages, IDN's, and native scripts.

For that matter, .mobi can be the common thread to tie in the entire mobile internet in much the way .com is recognized as being the common denominator for the PC.

I mean, lets face it...those kids on the streets aren't about to give up their phones for anyone or anything.

Would love to get your or the Marketing guru's thoughts on this.

[pilot]

thanks Sean!


Sure, if I hear of marketing efforts concerning .mobi or google.mobi I'll try to remember to send around a heads up.

[Scandiman]

Sean, thanks for all your input here, very enlightening. I've heard rumors of a mobile beta for adsense, would you happen to know about this initiative or be able to share any news about it?

[coast]

Thank you Sean. I had an informal internship of sorts at a tech company in the early 90's and worked in the office of the lone marketing guy in the engineering department for a project group. Guys, believe me, marketing and engineering don't mix that much. Don't you read Dilbert?

[Work In Progress]

Sean, thanks for all your input here, very enlightening. I've heard rumors of a mobile beta for adsense, would you happen to know about this initiative or be able to share any news about it?

I second this request. Could it be true? Mobile Adsense coming to our sites in to near future! :adore: Please tell me it's on the way.....:smile:

[warsteiner21]

We also have a strong interest in developing effective search for the mobile web, and as part of that, improving the quality and quantity of mobile web content out there. Sean, can I ask how mobile specific sites are currently treated by Google mobile search? The previous mobile search had an option to only display mobile results, whereas the current mobile search seems to omit them, at least for all the searches I have performed. Is Google's intention to eventually prioritize mobile-specific sites in mobile search results?

[srowen]

We wanted to stop forcing you to choose between transcoded web and mobile web-specific results (or images, or local results, etc.) There's been some outcry since there's currently no way to drill down on mobile-web-only results. I think the power users who want this capability will be pleased with some changes that will come soon to the new mobile UI. There is no particular intent to prioritize or de-prioritize mobile web results relative to others, but, this business of mixing different types of results is fairly new and still a work in progress. Expect it to get better over time. For some kinds of queries, yes I expect you will see more mobile web results over time since they're better results.

[srowen]

Late breaking news, isn't it -- take your pick of articles:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,134571-c,adsvisitortracking/article.html
Looks like we're inviting people into mobile AdSense, and it's exactly what you'd expect. A really small text ad, with the possibility of click-to-call links. The ads are the same sorts that have been running in AdWords, largely for carrier partners, for some time.

[Scandiman]

Late breaking news, isn't it -- take your pick of articles:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,134571-c,adsvisitortracking/article.html
Looks like we're inviting people into mobile AdSense, and it's exactly what you'd expect. A really small text ad, with the possibility of click-to-call links. The ads are the same sorts that have been running in AdWords, largely for carrier partners, for some time.

Excellent! Thanks for the link.

[Gerry]

Excellent! Thanks for the link.GREAT, SUPERB NEWS AND LINKS and information coming from Google.

Seeing that I no longer view or drop in the other forums, is this news making its rounds?

Are the MobiPhobics making a stand or putting their heads in the sand?


http://growabrain.typepad.com/growabrain/images/ostrich_head.jpg

http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/photos/santa_barbara_california/images/ostrich.jpg

http://verena.nomadlife.org/uploaded_images/ostrich-759977.jpg

[Scandiman]

GREAT, SUPERB NEWS AND LINKS and information coming from Google.

Seeing that I no longer view or drop in the other forums, is this news making its rounds?

Are the MobiPhobics making a stand or putting their heads in the sand?
Geez Gerry, you scared me with that photo. LOL! Increasingly I don't worry about what is said elsewhere. The facts are what they are.

[Gerry]

Geez Gerry, you scared me with that photo. LOL! Increasingly I don't worry about what is said elsewhere. The facts are what they are.Agree. Agree that is it scarey. Agree that I am not part of the "netherworld" anymore, and agree facts are facts...:adore:Google want you boys and girls to be part of the .mobi Google AdSense test!

Oh, boy, someone wake me up :sleep:

[mejcdj]

Is there an elsewhere?
I think we are fast becomming 'THE' mobile place to be.

I really enjoy reading your posts, Sean. You have already answered so many of our questions, and I am sure we will have many more.

Its refreshing, to all of us I am sure, to have a voice from a respected company like Google. You bring some 'real reality' to what we all saw when we registered our first .mobi. Thanks!

[cobo]

This is already the mobi place to be. That is for sure.
Now if I can just get that scary ostrich out of my mind so I can sleep without nightmares! :biggrin:

[ezinaz]

http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/06/good_web_sites.html;jsessionid=2HL1MWDNUCYZEQSNDLQ SKH0CJUNN2JVN?print=true


Is Google's New Search Bad For The Mobile Web?
Another hot topic was Google's new universal search initiative. Many in the audience felt that Google's new search was bad for the mobile Web. Instead of directing people to mobile-centric sites, universal search now sends users to desktop sites.
The problem here is that most desktop sites don't render well on mobile browsers, so search engines like Google and Yahoo deliver transcoded (http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/Xplore/login.jsp?url=/iel4/5971/15987/00740482.pdf?arnumber=740482) versions of these sites. Transcoded sites are usually a less than optimal experience on a mobile phone.
"The heart of transcoding is in the right place, but the problem is that there are no clear ways to opt out of transcoding," Harper said. "I think everyone needs to be more aware of this and hopefully posting more ways to opt out of transcoding."
Pasqua, however, defended Google's new search initiative, "We saw Google's move as a positive step, taking the onus off the end-user to choose the correct results." In short, Google's new mobile search presents one Web, not a balkanized Web (http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/04/google_lays_out.html;jsessionid=F4ETRV3OVCIRCQSNDL RSKHSCJUNN2JVN).


I'm not sure that transcoding is a great thing for the .mobi community. It appears as if we must compete now with all of the transcoded pages out there as well, which may not give the users the kind of rich user experience (customized for a small screen) that they are looking for.

So...is Google mobile search taking a gamble by including transcoded results in their search results? Will this cause users to go somewhere else to look for mobile-friendly sites? Will people who are on the go...using a small screen with potentially slow bandwidth...want to bounce around from result to result until they find a mobile friendly site?

Here's an idea that I'm sure has been bounced around...has Google considered adding a mobile friendliness score to their search results...and consider this score in their ranking algorithm?

An interesting...and I think fun direction to take this conversation.

Sean, I've teed it up for you...swing away...!

[srowen]

I'm not sure that transcoding is a great thing for the .mobi community. It appears as if we must compete now with all of the transcoded pages out there as well, which may not give the users the kind of rich user experience (customized for a small screen) that they are looking for.

So...is Google mobile search taking a gamble by including transcoded results in their search results? Will this cause users to go somewhere else to look for mobile-friendly sites? Will people who are on the go...using a small screen with potentially slow bandwidth...want to bounce around from result to result until they find a mobile friendly site?

Here's an idea that I'm sure has been bounced around...has Google considered adding a mobile friendliness score to their search results...and consider this score in their ranking algorithm?

Excellent topic. These are important points. The InformationWeek piece on the MoMo panel is a good read -- of course it is since yours truly took part in it. :biggrin: This was a hot topic there too.

First, the "blended" search results were in part intended to increase visibility of mobile web sites. A number of (presumably less savvy) users would search only the default of "Web" and not get what "Mobile Web" was. Now any search can potentially retrieve mobile web results.

Second, I think the request for more access to mobile web results has been heard -- keep your eye out for updates to the mobile search UI. I think you'll be pleased.

Third, webmasters who run a desktop and mobile site can make sure that the transcoder redirects to a mobile site, rather than transcode, by adding a tag like this in <head>:
<link rel="alternate" media="handheld" href="alternate_page.htm" />
See http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35312
I can't say for sure but I think other transcoders will recognize this too. While I understand this doesn't get the "foo.mobi" URL brand out there, it does help mobile users get to your site no matter what.

Lastly, I'm sure I should act very secretive about the search ranking algorithm, so can't say much there. The goal is definitely to give you the best mobile results, factoring in the quality and relevance of the result. We'd be dumb to not factor in in some way that transcoded results are of course not nearly as customized for mobile. :smile: Keep in mind it is going to depend on the nature of the query to an extent... if you want a news site, the customized mobile site is probably much more useful to you than a transcoded one; if you're searching for Mt. Everest's height to settle a bar trivia night dispute, you probably don't care if you find the answer of "29,029 feet" on a nice mobile page or transcoded desktop page.

[Scandiman]

Excellent topic. These are important points. The InformationWeek piece on the MoMo panel is a good read -- of course it is since yours truly took part in it. :biggrin: This was a hot topic there too.

First, the "blended" search results were in part intended to increase visibility of mobile web sites. A number of (presumably less savvy) users would search only the default of "Web" and not get what "Mobile Web" was. Now any search can potentially retrieve mobile web results.

Second, I think the request for more access to mobile web results has been heard -- keep your eye out for updates to the mobile search UI. I think you'll be pleased.

Third, webmasters who run a desktop and mobile site can make sure that the transcoder redirects to a mobile site, rather than transcode, by adding a tag like this in <head>:
<link rel="alternate" media="handheld" href="alternate_page.htm" />
See http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35312
I can't say for sure but I think other transcoders will recognize this too. While I understand this doesn't get the "foo.mobi" URL brand out there, it does help mobile users get to your site no matter what.

Lastly, I'm sure I should act very secretive about the search ranking algorithm, so can't say much there. The goal is definitely to give you the best mobile results, factoring in the quality and relevance of the result. We'd be dumb to not factor in in some way that transcoded results are of course not nearly as customized for mobile. :smile: Keep in mind it is going to depend on the nature of the query to an extent... if you want a news site, the customized mobile site is probably much more useful to you than a transcoded one; if you're searching for Mt. Everest's height to settle a bar trivia night dispute, you probably don't care if you find the answer of "29,029 feet" on a nice mobile page or transcoded desktop page.
Great input and thanks for pointing out the webmaster help link.

I've often thought that good mobile design leads to the antithesis of good SEO because of the minimized content. Without revealing your trade secrets can you shed some light on how we can strike the right balance between a useful site for mobile users and not bloating our sites with content for the purposes of SEO?

Also, I'm working on at least 2 site versions for the purpose of optimizing for different sized devices, how can I best avoid a duplicate content problem with Google?

[ezinaz]

Excellent topic. These are important points. The InformationWeek piece on the MoMo panel is a good read -- of course it is since yours truly took part in it. :biggrin: This was a hot topic there too.

First, the "blended" search results were in part intended to increase visibility of mobile web sites. A number of (presumably less savvy) users would search only the default of "Web" and not get what "Mobile Web" was. Now any search can potentially retrieve mobile web results.


Ok, then I'll just request a couple of minor mods to the mobile search, please default to the "Mobile Web" if the user is truly mobile...and...only return results where the domain is *.mobi. :laugh: Ok, only kidding...well, only half kidding!



Second, I think the request for more access to mobile web results has been heard -- keep your eye out for updates to the mobile search UI. I think you'll be pleased.


Fantastic! Looking forward to it.


On to a totally unrelated question. Seeing as that javascript is not supported by most mobile browsers, we are not able to take advantage of the Google Maps API for most mobile clients.
Google Local provides a nice mobile version of Google Maps. Is there an integration available to include Google Local Maps on our pages at this time? I haven't found any examples yet but feel that this would be a fantastic addition to many mobile websites.

Thanks!

EZINAZ

[srowen]

I've often thought that good mobile design leads to the antithesis of good SEO because of the minimized content. Without revealing your trade secrets can you shed some light on how we can strike the right balance between a useful site for mobile users and not bloating our sites with content for the purposes of SEO?

Also, I'm working on at least 2 site versions for the purpose of optimizing for different sized devices, how can I best avoid a duplicate content problem with Google?

As you say, it's not helpful to bloat your site just for search engines. In extreme cases that may be harmful; it's not good SEO. The sort of SEO that's always a good idea is pretty basic -- make sure you page can be found and parsed. Create good hyperlinks in your site and submit a sitemap; try to use valid mobile markup. Any other SEO tricks will probably eventually not work.

Duplicate content of this sort shouldn't be a problem. Make sure the crawler gets one of those two versions; I imagine the other is substantially the same. It should not be considered 'cloaking' or anything like that.

[srowen]

On to a totally unrelated question. Seeing as that javascript is not supported by most mobile browsers, we are not able to take advantage of the Google Maps API for most mobile clients.
Google Local provides a nice mobile version of Google Maps. Is there an integration available to include Google Local Maps on our pages at this time? I haven't found any examples yet but feel that this would be a fantastic addition to many mobile websites.

You can link to a local search, if that'll do. I don't know that there's much more of an API than that for now:
http://google.com/m/search?site=maps&q=(the address)

[Scandiman]

As you say, it's not helpful to bloat your site just for search engines. In extreme cases that may be harmful; it's not good SEO. The sort of SEO that's always a good idea is pretty basic -- make sure you page can be found and parsed. Create good hyperlinks in your site and submit a sitemap; try to use valid mobile markup. Any other SEO tricks will probably eventually not work.

Duplicate content of this sort shouldn't be a problem. Make sure the crawler gets one of those two versions; I imagine the other is substantially the same. It should not be considered 'cloaking' or anything like that.
Thanks again for the input and I totally agree that intentional content bloating is a bad practice. But w/ mobile design I find myself wanting to trim down reasonable PC content for the sake of screen size but the content starts to loose keyword meaning. Say for example I was developing parts.mobi and on the first page I had links to different brands. Normally I would build my links "Honda parts", "Toyota parts" etc to help reinforce the keywords together. But for a mobile site I may want to only list Honda, Toyota etc just to keep it lightweight. So in the interest of cleaner design I've lost the keyword pairing. Similarly my part descriptions will be very concise for the sake of the presentation medium and I'll loose keywords there as well. I'm just curious if you all are trying to accommodate this problem in your algorithms.

In regards to the hyperlinks, how would you characterize a good one vs a bad one?

Also, what method would you recommend to have the crawler see one site version and avoid another. I'll be using WURFL to direct the users to the appropriate version. You're correct, the versions will be substantially the same. But in the future there may develop some larger differences as some phone models continue to advance beyond todays offerings. The device diversity creates the need. Also, if I offer a full fledged PC site version then there may be considerably more content there vs. the mobile site. If the PC site were crawled, would this be a case of cloaking in that the mobile users don't see all the content that is being indexed by google?

.

[srowen]

Thanks again for the input and I totally agree that intentional content bloating is a bad practice. But w/ mobile design I find myself wanting to trim down reasonable PC content for the sake of screen size but the content starts to loose keyword meaning. Say for example I was developing parts.mobi and on the first page I had links to different brands. Normally I would build my links "Honda parts", "Toyota parts" etc to help reinforce the keywords together. But for a mobile site I may want to only list Honda, Toyota etc just to keep it lightweight. So in the interest of cleaner design I've lost the keyword pairing. Similarly my part descriptions will be very concise for the sake of the presentation medium and I'll loose keywords there as well. I'm just curious if you all are trying to accommodate this problem in your algorithms.

In regards to the hyperlinks, how would you characterize a good one vs a bad one?

Also, what method would you recommend to have the crawler see one site version and avoid another. I'll be using WURFL to direct the users to the appropriate version. You're correct, the versions will be substantially the same. But in the future there may develop some larger differences as some phone models continue to advance beyond todays offerings. The device diversity creates the need. Also, if I offer a full fledged PC site version then there may be considerably more content there vs. the mobile site. If the PC site were crawled, would this be a case of cloaking in that the mobile users don't see all the content that is being indexed by google?

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You have a good point. I still don't think you should try to design for search engines. For example the "Toyota parts" page presumably has those keywords together even if the link doesn't. I don't think one has to be so spartan on mobile pages that it becomes a problem for information retrieval algorithms; if it did it would probably be a problem for users too.

Good hyperlinks -- I just mean it's in your interest to make it easy for users, and thus crawlers to find your whole site, which probably means everything's linked in some way and that links are labeled constructively and all that. But of course sitemaps also helps discovery.

The mobile crawl User-Agent header always contains "Googlebot-Mobile" so you can look for that if you like. The rest resembles the User-Agent for some common phone, a Nokia I believe, so those using string-matching approaches should correctly serve mobile content. WURFL no doubt has an entry for Googlebot. It doesn't really matter which mobile version you send back; I'd just avoid sending back anything that looks like it's exclusively for high-end phones (e.g. really large markup) since it might be deemed not mobile. I wouldn't worry about cloaking. It's well known that one URL may return different content to the mobile crawl signature.

[Scandiman]

You have a good point. I still don't think you should try to design for search engines. For example the "Toyota parts" page presumably has those keywords together even if the link doesn't. I don't think one has to be so spartan on mobile pages that it becomes a problem for information retrieval algorithms; if it did it would probably be a problem for users too.
I would venture to say we have to design for search engines more than you may realize. There are plenty of instances where we put content in just to get indexed on those keywords. Not in an effort to deceive but to simply be included.

Using my example for parts.mobi (not my domain by the way):

The parts.mobi/honda/wheels page may list all the available wheels for hondas but if I don't include the word rims in the page a user searching for "honda rims" probably won't find me (Google both honda wheels and honda rims and you will see that these synonymous terms give different results). I'm not trying to bloat my pages or deceive anyone, I'm simply trying to accommodate the various terms that people use for the given part. Good site building needs to do this or will be left out in the cold. It's a fact of life. Ideally for mobile I don't want to use all this term mixing because it will make the page more content heavy than I may want.

So this leads to my dilemma, design for a cleaner/lightweight mobile site that is easier for users to navigate, or include the various terms for things in my content so the search engines will at least associate my site with those terms. Where do I strike the balance? I don't know and at this point my question is almost rhetorical but I'm just taking this unique opportunity to share with you the problems that mobile designers face. This is our livelihood so hopefully you can appreciate it is a real concern for many and perhaps this input can help in the decisions you face as you perform your algorithm magic.

I can't begin to adequately express my appreciation for your time in addressing our questions here. Hopefully you find it useful as well.

[srowen]

I would venture to say we have to design for search engines more than you may realize. There are plenty of instances where we put content in just to get indexed on those keywords. Not in an effort to deceive but to simply be included.

Using my example for parts.mobi (not my domain by the way):

The parts.mobi/honda/wheels page may list all the available wheels for hondas but if I don't include the word rims in the page a user searching for "honda rims" probably won't find me (Google both honda wheels and honda rims and you will see that these synonymous terms give different results). I'm not trying to bloat my pages or deceive anyone, I'm simply trying to accommodate the various terms that people use for the given part. Good site building needs to do this or will be left out in the cold. It's a fact of life. Ideally for mobile I don't want to use all this term mixing because it will make the page more content heavy than I may want.

So this leads to my dilemma, design for a cleaner/lightweight mobile site that is easier for users to navigate, or include the various terms for things in my content so the search engines will at least associate my site with those terms. Where do I strike the balance? I don't know and at this point my question is almost rhetorical but I'm just taking this unique opportunity to share with you the problems that mobile designers face. This is our livelihood so hopefully you can appreciate it is a real concern for many and perhaps this input can help in the decisions you face as you perform your algorithm magic.

All good points again. In this example I hope we match "rims" as a synonym for "wheels". There's no way your page can take responsibility for every possible synonym and this part should be up to the search engines. But they may not -- not in every case. But then again the search engines that do this better attract more users, so the ones doing this well should win out.

There's no 100% solution here. I suppose the answer isn't any different than on the web, and you are well aware of how to make the content of your page clear to the search engine there. Your point is that mobile pages are necessarily smaller, and I suppose my feeling is that they're not so much smaller that it significantly hurts your efforts to make sure all your page's content is clear. I suppose my advice is to proceed as usual, design for users, keep the search engine in mind as you have and not worry too much about how being terse will hurt that approach. I speak from my general impression that this has not been identified as a major issue internally based on research.

[Reece]

Scandi, take a peek at my quercetin.mobi site which I started yesterday. The information is very good, however because I'm trying to keep everything concise, I intentionally use words that describe my site well (i.e. quercetin) more often than I would on a desktop designed site. I play with the headings to make everyone (including SE) know that what is being talked about (quercetin) is the main focus of the site. I have named my links to describe exactly what information will be found on them. It's not close to done yet, however I have no doubt it will rank well once completed. SEO for a .mobi isn't much different than a .com, just need to be careful to make sure you use your words better -- which is a good thing. Black Hat SEO will be much harder on a .mobi, so hopefully those of us playing by the rules will rank well in mobile SE :)