More on 'Mobilegeddon'

BY GARRY J. WISE

Law Times picked up on our April 30 post about Google's new mobile compliance requirements with an excellent article last week by writer Michael McKiernan, Focus: Law firms slow to respond to ‘Mobilegeddon’ .

I'm quoted in the article quite extensively:

For Garry Wise, founder of Toronto-based Wise Law Office, Mobilegeddon came in the middle of an update of the firm’s web site.

“Neither the old site nor the new version was going to be mobile compliant,” he says, noting the coming changes led to a redesign on short notice.

According to Wise, somewhere between 30 and 50 per cent of the firm’s web site traffic comes from users of mobile technology.

Although the precise consequences of a failure to become mobile friendly remain unclear thanks to the secrecy that surrounds the exact composition of Google’s algorithms, he says he’d rather not take any chances.

“If you’ve traditionally done really well on Google searches, then failing to be mobile friendly could have serious consequences as to where you fall on a mobile search,” he says.

“It’s going to have a direct impact on how many clicks you’re getting and how many people are finding your web site. We’ve made a number of adjustments on the fly and we’re still adjusting.”

Wise says law firms should treat the new rules as a spur to adjust to the new realities of Internet use and think more about mobile users at the earliest stages of web site design.

“I think for anyone who is building a new web site or updating an old one, they should probably think about mobile-first technology. A lot of things that work well in a desktop universe just do not translate well to mobile. This is going to affect creative design as well as content,” he says.

“Lawyers need to build their web sites with mobile in mind and the first question of designers should be: How will this look on an iPhone or similar device? If the answer is you can’t read it, then get back to work because you haven’t got it right.”

Many thanks to Michael for the kind mention.

 - Garry J. Wise, Toronto

Visit our Toronto Law Office website: www.wiselaw.net