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You are here: Home / Google / Google Starts Warning Websites That Redirect Mobile to Homepage

Google Starts Warning Websites That Redirect Mobile to Homepage

August 12, 2014 at 4:00 am PST By Jennifer Slegg

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A couple of months ago, Google warned webmasters that they would be showing an alert in the Google search results to mobile users who were attempting to go to an internal page of a website but the website itself redirects all mobile users to the homepage instead. Now, Google has started sending letters to websites who are forwarding mobile users to the homepage.

google mobile warningMarie Haynes of HIS Web Marketing was the first to notice the new alert.  It was emailed to all users registered to the account and there was also a notice within Google Webmaster Tools.  Nothing showed up as a crawl alert error or in HTML improvements area of GWT.

It is good that Google is starting to alert webmasters to this, as people are still surprised when they learn how their site is handling mobile traffic.  Webmasters should be careful that they aren’t hijacking a mobile user’s intent by sending them to the homepage, as it is a very poor user experience – not to mention a pet peeve of many mobile users.

Added: Marie tweeted today that it is now showing up in the crawl errors section as well.

mobile redirect alert

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Jennifer Slegg

Founder & Editor at The SEM Post
Jennifer Slegg is a longtime speaker and expert in search engine marketing, working in the industry for almost 20 years. When she isn't sitting at her desk writing and working, she can be found grabbing a latte at her local Starbucks or planning her next trip to Disneyland. She regularly speaks at Pubcon, SMX, State of Search, Brighton SEO and more, and has been presenting at conferences for over a decade.
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Latest posts by Jennifer Slegg (see all)

  • 2022 Update for Google Quality Rater Guidelines – Big YMYL Updates - August 1, 2022
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  • Rethinking Affiliate Sites With Google’s Product Review Update - April 23, 2021
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Filed Under: Google, Mobile Tagged With: Google, Google Webmaster Tools, Mobile

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  1. Mobile-Friendly May Become Google Ranking Signal With Addition of New Tag in Search Results - The SEM Post says:
    November 20, 2014 at 6:13 am

    […] is a very dominant force in search and the search share continues to rise. In August, Google began warning webmasters when their sites were redirecting mobile users to the homepage, as opposed to the internal page […]

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