Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages Project

Revolution is coming as Google announces a new open source initiative called Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), which is designed to dramatically improve the performance of the mobile web.

For many, reading on the mobile web is a slow, clunky and frustrating experience – but it doesn’t have to be that way. The Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) Project is an open source initiative that embodies the vision that publishers can create mobile optimized content once and have it load instantly everywhere. (https://www.ampproject.org/)

Aim is to enable webpages with rich content like video, animations and graphics to load instantaneously and also work with smart ads regardless of mobile device used. Such move will further expand Google advertising real estate and is definitely a smart move.

Google heralds AMP project as “the start of an exciting collaboration with publishers and technology companies, who have all come together to make the mobile web work better for everyone.”
At the moment Twitter,Pinterest, WordPress.com, Chartbeat, Parse.ly, Adobe Analytics and LinkedIn are among the first group of technology partners planning to integrate AMP HTML pages.

AMP project will be focused on providing functionality focused on some key areas:

1. Content: The Accelerated Mobile Pages Project will provide an open source approach, allowing publishers to focus on producing great content using the shared components for high performance and great user experience. The initial technical specification is now available on https://github.com/ampproject/amphtml

2. Distribution: Google has designed a new approach to caching that allows the publisher to continue to host their content while allowing for efficient distribution through Google’s high performance global cache. This means that Google will follow up by opening their cache servers to be used by anyone free of charge.

3. Advertising: Google declares they will work with publishers in the industry to help define the parameters of an ad experience that provides the speed we’re striving for with AMP.

 

Questions? – Explore common FAQs around AMP

Original source: https://googleblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/introducing-accelerated-mobile-pages.html

Google Mobile Friendliness and App Banners

Google have just posted about new update to mobile friendliness indicating that in order to provide good user experience on mobile devices app install interstitial can not any longer cover/hide significant amount of the on-page content.

“Starting today, we’ll be updating the Mobile-Friendly Test to indicate that sites should avoid showing app install interstitial that hide a significant amount of content on the transition from the search result page. The Mobile Usability report in Search Console will show webmasters the number of pages across their site that have this issue.”

In terms of the timeline for this update Google says that after November 1 any mobile web page that show an app install interstitial that hides a significant amount of content on the transition from the search result page will no longer be considered as mobile-friendly.

Google won’t punish sites using the standard app install banners in Chrome and Safari; this is aimed at the huge annoying overlays purposely blocking access to the desired content.

Source: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/mobile-friendly-web-pages-using-app.html

Better presentation of URLs in mobile search results

Google has announced today that in order to help mobile searchers understand your website better in mobile search results they’re updating the algorithms that display URLs in the search results to better reflect the names of websites, using the real-world name of the site instead of the domain name, and the URL structure of the sites in a breadcrumbs-like format.

These changes are rolling out gradually and affect only mobile results.

Source:http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/better-presentation-of-urls-in-search.html

Google drive app installs through App Indexing

So far Google using App Indexing has already been helping people to engage Android app after they’ve installed it. Google also indicates that they have well over 30 billion links within apps indexed.

Google has now made next step, as of this week people searching on Google can also discover an app even if they haven’t installed it yet.

If you’re an app developer and have implemented App Indexing, then there is a big chance that if content from an app is relevant to a search done on Google on Android devices, people may start to see app install buttons for this app in search results. These buttons will take visitor to the Google Play store where they can install the app, then continue straight on to the right content within it.

Source:http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/drive-app-installs-through-app-indexing.html

Google Launches New Search Interface For Slower Mobile Connections

Google announced on Wednesday 8th April;

“To make sure you’re not waiting on Google when you need it most, we’ve rolled out a streamlined Search results page that loads fast, even on those slow connections. You’ll get all the info you need in a simpler format that’s beautiful and easy to use. Best of all: there’s nothing new to download or update — the lighter version will kick in automatically when needed!”

Source: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+google/posts/XZo6qgrNDE9

Taking into the account almost 7 billion mobile contracts and over 30% smartphone penetration plus unstoppable growth in Africa and Asian countries this is very important development.

Google Mobile-Friendly Algorithm Unlikely to Impact Brand Searches

With mobile algorithm update closing by (21st April) John Muller has confirmed during Webmaster hangouts on 7th April that brand terms are unlikely to be affected even for the sites which aren’t mobile friendly;

“So in general, what happens with these kind of demotions is that we try to demote the sites a little bit and what will happen with a branded query or one where we know it is very navigation is we know that this is a really strong result and even if we demote it slightly it will still be up top. So it’s something where I’d say there is no effect at all on branded queries because there is somehow magically different. It’s just that these sites are often very relevant for these queries and even if they are slightly demoted then it is not going to drop them from page one or drop them, sometime snot even from the first position. So that is something where we don’t treat the brand queries in any way special there, but these pages are really relevant and sometimes even if they are demoted slightly, then there still the top result.”

Source; https://www.seroundtable.com/google-brand-mobile-friendly-algorithm-20115.html
Video source (John Muller 37:53) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipiV2EH8d-M#t=2273 ” title=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipiV2EH8d-M#t=2273

The upcoming mobile-friendly change is for mobile users not including tablet users

According to Google the upcoming algorithm update on the 21st will only impact searches done only on smartphones with exclusion to the tablet searches. This does not impact desktop searches and it does not impact tablet searches. That should definitely make life a bit easier and let’s hope Google will stick to its promise.

Source; https://twitter.com/googlewmc/status/583384126977363968

Mobile friendliness a ranking factor

As part of the mobile market’s evolution, Google recently announced changes to their SEO ranking algorithm that significantly improves the experience of using the web on smartphones.

The goal of these changes: to improve search results for smartphone-friendly websites and penalise sites that make mobile browsing difficult.

Big news: Expected Algorithmic update – April 21

Google has announced two major developments, regarding mobile friendly search results, in their Webmaster Central Blog.

1. Mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal

This update will definitely shake many webmasters;

Starting April 21, we will be expanding our use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results. Consequently, users will find it easier to get relevant, high quality search results that are optimized for their devices.

2. More relevant app content in search results

Second announcement was focused on how Google includes and cross references app content in the SERPs;

It’s important to know that, moving forward, Google will be using mobile friendliness as a stronger ranking factor that will “significantly” affect rankings worldwide.Good news is that Google provides test which will analyse a URL (any given page of your site) and report if the page has a mobile-friendly design.

You can find more information regarding mobile SEO in dedicated section on this site.