New search products for our cell phones and PDA are coming out and existing ones maturing. This session looks at how to ensure your content is optimized for these mobile search tools.

Moderator:

• Detlev Johnson, VP, Director of Consulting, Position Technologies

Speakers:

• Cindy Krum, Senior SEO Analyst, Blue Moon Works
• Rachel Pasqua, Director of Mobile Marketing, iCrossing
• Gregory Markel, Founder/President, Infuse Creative, LLC

Rachel Pasqua the Director of Mobile Marketing at iCrossing said that iCrossing, the company she works for began showing interest in mobile SEO in 2005. So this lady does know more than a bit. She also declared that Mobile SEO must be on everyone's agenda as there exists just 1 billion computer users while mobile users are a whopping 2.3 billion. After all most businesses require a mobile phone more than they would, a computer. Makes sense!

Gregory Markel of Infuse Creative, LLC stated that WAP or .Mobi is no longer dominant. With services like the Nokia S60, iPhone and Opera Mini true web browser, the real web has expanded to mobile phones and before most people download all these software on their phones, we have to optimize for mobile phones as optimizing after all is marketing.

According to Markel, there are 3 tips for mobile optimization:

• A website should have different looking style sheets for both mobile and computer web browsers.
• There also should be an exclusive site for cellphone users.
• Get listed in Google locals so that your business expands to people who employ voice activated searches.

The last speaker was Blue Moon Works' Cindy Krum a Senior SEO Analyst. Cindy started by saying that the mobile infancy is still in a state of infancy. The kind of crawlers that exist in mobile search is different from the computer web search engine browsers. Also one can make the best of all the available options in browsers.

Why is External CSS ideal for mobile?

• Separates content from design for easy design/updates
• Minimizes Code Required to render the page
• Decreases Load Time (external Vs. embedded)
• Ensures Correct Display on Different Screen Resolutions (use %s and relative positioning)
• Allows you to specify rendering based on the device with multiple external style sheets.

She gave lots of useful suggestions:

• Adopts the best SEO practices.
• Use an XHTML code as it is kinder to errors makes your website look good , no matter what platform you are on.
• Use javascript and external stylesheets.
• Size of file should be minimal.
• Get your site indexed by mobile search engine crawlers.
• Use different kinds of CSS files for computer and cellphone rendering.
• Hide items in the mobile CSS or re-arrange items to ensure that content isn’t pushed to far down the mobile page.
• Create and mintain a mobile site map.
• All relevant data should be available to the mobile search user at easy promiximity (easy clicks).
• Ensure phone numbers are easy to click so users can dial just with a click.
• Integrate videos and podcasts into your mobile.
• Incorporate jump links so as to reduce traffic in your site's content area.
• Refrain from using Flash or similar applications as plugins are not supported by all types of phones.

IMAGE SOURCE: Top Rank Blog

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