Remember when we announced that Google is creating a separate index for mobile and desktop? Well, something pretty exciting has come out of that, and it has been picked up by SEO experts everywhere.

In previous years, Google has told webmasters that any text on their website that’s hidden behind drop-downs, accordions, tabs may not be crawled by websites, or, if it is, it won’t be given the full weight.

Now, Google are saying that when the mobile index rolls out this won’t be the case on mobile. See the official Tweet by Google’s Gary Illyes below:

This is further supported by the fact that Google AMP released accordion support for AMP earlier this year.

Example of accordion layout below:

Why Should You Care:

This means that webmasters will soon be able to take advantage of accordion-type layouts on mobile, which is not only helpful for the user, but also good for SEO (as it allows one to add more useful copy without cluttering the page).

On a deeper level, it also shows Google’s commitment to the UX design and layout on mobile. In the past, webmasters have had to make compromises and find the balance between great UX and great SEO – but no longer.

Google’s algo now uses machine learning to refine searches based on UX signals, and changes like these encourage webmasters to design for the user-first and forget about the old SEO rules.

Of course, improving your UX on mobile will improve Google’s overall impression of your mobile site (as it’ll result in less bounces etc.), which in turn improves their overall impression on your website in general – on both mobile and desktop – as the two are obviously linked. So be sure to take advantage of new opportunities like these.

The mobile index hasn’t been rolled out yet, but our advice is to spend this time getting your mobile site looking as slick as possible for when it does.

Tags: Accelerated Mobile Pages, Google AMP, mobile first, mobile internet, Mobile search