Have you ever tried to visit a website on your phone and got so disappointed by its download speed that you felt like ramming your phone into a concrete wall? Imagine your website is the one that is causing so much frustration. This is a digital business’s worst nightmare. Not only will this reduce growth but will also give the website a bad reputation.
When smart phones became readily accessible, big companies like Google, WordPress, Twitter, BBC, and a few others, felt the need to make mobile web faster. Smartphones became accessible to us a few years ago. Though this meant we had technology at the snap of our fingers, it did hinder the way we say a website. Most mobile phones cannot process the amount of information within a website and therefore it appears slowly on the device. This reduces business opportunities for many big companies online. Which is why companies like Google launched the AMP project.
Accelerated Mobile Pages or AMP was designed to make mobile internet faster. Simply put, AMP is a regular html page with some restrictions that makes it faster on mobile phones. Most websites are static pages that require limited interaction from the viewer. Therefore, the bare bones html version of the page is usually enough for viewer satisfaction.
In the age where everything readily available, to those who have limited attention spans, speed matters! If your website is not fast enough for mobile users, they can simply leave your website which is devastating for your company’s growth! To solve this issues, consider adding AMP, on your website, for your mobile users.
Here is How AMP Works:
The main objective of AMP was to improve the loading time of a website. You may have benefited from AMP without even knowing it. Whenever you run a search on Google, you will notice a lightening icon on the left of certain pages. This means that by clicking on the pages you will receive the AMP version of that page.
AMP uses customised versions of the html or java script. It is a smart processor that controls the load chain of your website. This means that it gives privileges to certain pages and prevents the website from pages that slow down loading speed. In most cases, this allows third party content (like ads and pop ups) to load after your main page content. In fact, AMP makes sure that ads don’t take up more than an allotted screen space. This will prevent full page advertisement pop ups that no one cares about. AMP can be programmed such that the ad, or newsletter pop up, appears after the user has scrolled down to the end of the page.
AMP requires all website defining attributes, like the length and height of images etc, to be set beforehand. This will allow the processor to pre-determine how the web page looks before a user loads the page. This saves companies from a messy situation of multiple half loaded pages with unfinished content.
How Can It Help Your Business?
Research shows that 53% users leave the page if its download does not start within 3 seconds! Three seconds is very little to grab your user’s attention. AMP will ensure that the website remains engaging and pleasant for users to invest their time in it. This will substantially reduce your chances of losing a customer.
Since AMP makes your website accessible to a variety of devices, at high speed, it helps improve your website SEO.
Faster downloadable pages allow repeated user interactions. If your website is not fast enough, most users will leave! This will lead to a high bounce rate even if you have great content to offer. AMP helps reduce this issue. If pages download within five seconds, users are more likely to surf through other pages of the same website.
Here are a few other benefits of AMP:
Monetising with AMP
Though AMP aims to prioritise your content over the ads on your page, it does not mean that you will lose out on conversions. Most place ads on websites for revenue, but these ads slow the page down and lead to unsatisfied customers. If, your users like your content but are frustrated by the innumerable ads they will install an ad blocker. This will also affect your revenue.
AMP was developed with the intention of monetisation. It aims for affective monetisation so that the ads do not hinder the user accessing the page. If the user is happy with the website, and is interested in the featured ad, they may as well click on it.
Easy Setup
If you use a Content Management System (CMS) like WordPress, Magento and Drupal, setting AMP becomes extremely easy. These systems have an AMP plugin where you can set up an system analytics through yoast. This makes for easy installation and it doesn’t take WordPress users longer than a few minutes to set it up!
Selectivity
If your website only supplies content, it is important for you to add AMP. But if you are not a content provider, you can also benefit from AMP. It is not important for all your websites to have it. That’s right! You can have AMP on your homepage and on your blog and perhaps keep your product pages free from it. You can also switch back to AMP on your product check out pages to have faster conversions.
These are some reasons why you should really consider getting AMP on your website. But before you go ahead with it, it is important for you to be aware of few limitations of this program:
Limitations
- Since it works best with static pages, news websites and blogs benefit from AMP processors. However, websites that require user interactions, like e-commerce websites, are limited by AMP
- It limits the designability of your website. The AMP version is a simplified version of your website. Now, if minimalism does not harm your business vision, this may not be a problem. However, if you want to have more freedom in terms of design and complexity, AMP may not be up your alley.
- If your AMP page is not configured properly it will publicly display – ‘your AMP page is not set up properly’. This can affect your website image and may reduce conversions. Therefore, it is important to install AMP properly. For any assistance, please have a look at org.
Since most users browse the internet with their smart phones it is important to make services readily accessible to them. Slower download speed can lead to unhappy consumers. And unhappy consumers lead to poor business conversions. By adding AMP to your website, you can benefit make information and services easily accessible to a wider range on consumers. In the long run this will help you make faster conversions, greater user satisfaction and lower bounce rates.
AMP simply makes your business accessible to more people. In an age where there is so much competition and reduced attention spans it is important to stay ahead with technology. Add AMP to your website and you will see a change in the way mobile users interact with your website.
