Since its inception, the AMP project has been in controversy. It ensures quick page load and more visibility in the search engine result pages (SERPs), though demanding submission to a stripped-down HTML structure. In simple words, it means your website is on a diet to make the web pages look appealing to online visitors. According to an article published on Search Engine Journal, you will find shimmering case studies, the execution of the AMP project was disorganized with perplexing results for many.
What AMP Means
AMP or accelerated mobile pages, means web pages that are lightweight made to provide mobile users with a speedy and engaging browsing experience. AMP is an open-source HTML structure offering an uncomplicated and straightforward way to design web pages, which are fast, easy-loading, and emphasizing on the user experience above everything else.
It means creating a basic, optimized for mobile AMP duplicate of present HTML5 web page content. With an AMP substitute, the visitors get the AMP version instead of the canonical page. The goal is to ensure mobile content is consumed quickly, like Apple News or Facebook Instant Articles.
AMP holds up content distribution on the open internet without undergoing any platform-oriented app.
The AMP project has the support of LinkedIn, WordPress, Bing, Pinterest, and Twitter, to name a few. Then, the search engine giant Google is the primary code provider and major advocate to such an extent that people call it Google AMP.
AMP emphasizes the user experience via the implementation of limitations on user interface design and ads. These include restriction of CSS to 75 KB, limiting JavaScript to 150 KB, and moving the entire ruffle out of the crucial rendering trail.
Such limitations are adequate to build fast web pages, and so not a secret sauce making it instantaneous.
The Technical Aspect
AMP pages are driven so that they could be hosted on Google servers to ensure fast delivery. It lets the search engine giant to preload, cache, as well as pre-render AMP content before a visitor clicks on the search results. When visitors click the AMP content in Google, the result might be shown in one of these two ways:
Signed Exchange (SXG):
It lets your browser use the web page as if it fits in your sphere. When it comes to signed AMP content, it’s delivered, including standard AMP HTML. Out of these two ways, the search engine would emphasize on connecting to the signed content but solely for web browsers supporting the same, which is presently simply Google Chrome, and just for typical outcomes, and not top stories carousel. It limits the potential of SXG quite inadequate.
Google AMP Viewer:
It is where the content publisher source is shown at the peak, yet the URL stays as a Google domain.
The Benefits of AMP Pages
There are several rewards of AMP pages, based on the kind of website you have, including enhanced server efficiency, reduced data usage, more ad visibility, and a free CDN. Here are some of the top benefits of AMP pages:
More Visibility in the SERPs:
As far as AMP pages are concerned, they are for all time and go together with an improved appearance in the SERPs on mobile devices. At an essential point, AMP pages are often emphasized with the lightning bolt image in the search results pages of Google.
A few marketers have cited that this aspect augments the click-through rate or CTR of web pages, as visitors would pick AMP results understanding that it will direct them to a quick loading web page.
As it might lead to a trivial boost in specific industries, experts in the industry have not witnessed any statistically related information to support that assertion for the major market.
Swipe to Visit Option:
Did you know that there is a special swipe to visit option for AMP pages when it is used on smartphones or mobile devices. When a visitor chooses a picture, they can see a preview of the website header that they can swipe up to land on the source web page.
AMP and Organized Data:
AMP, together with suitable prearranged data, improves the possibility to come into view with a host carousel, like shows for recipes, courses, restaurants, and movies. It may also be displayed with rich features like headline copy as well as bigger than thumbnail images. Then, AMP is not mandatory for these improved features.
Tips to Boost AMP Pages
It is not necessary that AMP adopters will see an increased or enhanced result. Here is how you can optimize AMP pages or hire an expert at Social Market Way:
Make Certain of Discoverability:
You can include more information related to an AMP page to another non-AMP page and vice-versa. You can do so in this way, rel=“amphtml,” i.e., on the AMP and rel=“canonical,” i.e., on the non-AMP versions like <link> tags in the <head>.
Making Fully Functional:
Interactive and customization components like social media sharing icons, navigation menu, login, related forms, as well as ads, should work similarly, just like the canonical edition.
Uniform User Interface:
Though there is a requirement of small variations or changes because of AMP limitations, the design scheme and user interface must be the same when you look at canonical and AMP versions of a similar web page.
AMP-Friendly Logo:
The logo that is used should adhere to the AMP principles, or it would be badly displayed or not in any way on the top stories carousel.
Check for SEO Component Uniformity:
Certain things like HLS, hreflang, suitable structured data, and alt image text must be present no doubt, but mainly on AMP as well as canonical pages because any inconsistency could affect online visibility.
Conclusion
Making your website mobile-friendly takes some time, and it does not happen overnight. You need to hire an experienced web developer who knows how to put your site’s mobile SEO riddle together in the right way. It would be best if you stay updated by reading numerous online resources on AMP and SEO before proceeding with the project management aspect.