Google Webmaster Tools Notifications For Faulty Mobile Redirects

Aug 12, 2014 - 9:05 am 8 by

Google Webmaster ToolsIn June, Google began showing a notice of faulty redirects within the Google search results page that told the searchers that if they click on that search results from their smartphone, it may take them to the site's home page instead of the page they are expecting.

A couple months later, Google has begun notifying the webmasters that this impacts. So in June, the searchers were shown a prompt in the search results. But now, webmasters are being notified of this via Google Webmaster Tools.

A Google Webmaster Help thread has one webmaster who received the notice, it reads:

Stop redirecting smartphone users to the homepage of domain.com

Dear webmaster of http://www.domain.com/,

Google systems have detected that your desktop site URLs redirect smartphone users to the homepage of the smartphone site rather than the page they found in Search results. This critical issue causes problems for Googlebot for smartphones because it can’t access your smartphone URLs. It also confuses your users.

@Marie_Haynes has a nice screen shot of this as well:

click for full size

I am a bit upset they didn't send out these warnings prior to implementing the fault redirect prompt in the search results. This would have given webmasters time to implement it correctly and not lose click throughs from the search results.

But I guess, better late than never?

Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Search Video Recaps

 
- YouTube
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: July 18, 2025

Jul 18, 2025 - 10:00 am
Search Video Recaps

Search News Buzz Video Recap: Google June Core Update Done, Local Ranking Update, AI Mode Updates & AI Calling Businesses

Jul 18, 2025 - 8:01 am
Google Maps

New Google Business Profile Check Edit Status

Jul 18, 2025 - 7:51 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Google: Login Service Pages Are Hard To Rank In Search

Jul 18, 2025 - 7:41 am
Google

Google AI Overviews For Movie Queries

Jul 18, 2025 - 7:31 am
Google Ads

Google Ads Rolling Out Smart Bidding Exploration To Some Advertisers

Jul 18, 2025 - 7:21 am
Previous Story: Google HTTPS: Run On A Per URL Basis In Real Time & Not Part Of Panda