South Cumbrian businesses look set to shoot up Google search rankings after receiving a masterclass in the latest in digital strategy.

The Google Garage event, organised by in-Cumbria.com, saw over 50 local business people gather at Furness College in Barrow on Thursday.

The masterclass kicked off with a panel of local digital experts, including Lancaster digital marketing agency SearchQuest, Cumbria-based legal experts Baines Wilson and Barrow police.

That was the warm up to a two-hour workshop with Google expert Abbey Oladapo. He highlighted the vital importance of mobile websites, and showed businesses how they can climb Google's rankings.

He said: "The world is changing and mobile is becoming more and more important, it is growing massively.

"It is something that businesses need to look into now, but there are ways to improve this.

"Google has a tool that will analyse how mobile friendly your website is in several areas. You need to make sure your website loads quickly on a mobile.

"I used to think it was five seconds but now it needs to be two seconds and in future probably one second.

"Your website needs to be readable on a small screen, easily clickable, and really user-friendly."

Mr Oladapo, who delivers scores of training sessions every year, also explained how Google search indexing - the way that Google decides what displays first in search results - has changed recently.

He added: "People think that just stuffing keywords onto pages is how to improve search results, but there's always a danger that you can be penalised for keyword stuffing.

"The content has to be good, engaging. Keywords are important and you need to identify which keywords are best for you but the content is very important as well."

A wide variety of local businesses attended the event, including cartoonist and illustrator Colin Shelbourn, who said that the internet was the reason he hasn't moved to London.

His clients are both national and international, so the digital strategy the meeting centred on is vital to his business.

Mr Shelbourn added: "Hearing about the mobile websites was important to me as my work is very visual so I need to think about how that will work on a smaller screen.

"I do blog regularly and think about the content on my website. I work with clients locally and across the world. When the internet came along that stopped me from moving to London."

The event was sponsored by Connecting Cumbria, and also featured Barrow police problem solver Sergeant Rupert Anderson, who spoke about how the force has emerged as a pioneer of using social media to connect the force with the public.