AMP Do’s & Don’ts for Superhero Results #SearchCamp

#ampsuccess by @aleyda from @orainti at #searchcamp

AMP Do’s & Don’ts for Superhero Results


I’m Aleyda Solis


I help companies to connect with them through organic search results



Some are brands you likely know



Having a fast mobile Website is one of the fundamental aspects to achieve this goal


Which will be even more critical with Google’s upcoming mobile first index too


Users have minimum speed expectations


Probably because of this


But this is our speed reality

https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/marketing-resources/data-measurement/mobile-page-speed-new-industry-benchmarks/


Let’s see: How much time the BBC mobile home page takes to load?


Ouch

https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com


And the Asos one?


Yup


And the House of Fraser?


I think I’ve made my point


The solution is to implement WPO principles to make Mobile sites to load fast

https://developers.google.com/speed/docs/insights/rules


But big sites have restrictive legacy platforms & small ones little resources to improve them


This is why Google launched AMP


It uses a “simplified” HTML version with optimised resources & cache to serve faster in Mobile SERPs

https://www.ampproject.org/learn/overview/


AMP is published “parallely” and canonicalized to your current (slower) Mobile Web pages

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanwolk/2017/09/07/apple-is-losing-its-cool-factor-and-thats-a-problem-if-they-want-to-break-

into-tv/#4707740c71f8

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanwolk/2017/09/07/apple-is-losing-its-cool-factor-and-thats-a-problem-if-they-want-to-break-into-tv/amp/

Canonical URL AMP URL





It’s also cached and pre-rendered by Google when shown in Mobile SERPs

Google AMP Viewer URLthat is pre-rendered

Canonical URL of the Page

Content served from AMP Cache

URL


Canonical URL AMP URL

Making it certainly much faster

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanwolk/2017/09/07/apple-is-losing-its-cool-factor-and-thats-a-problem-if-they-want-to-break-

into-tv/#4707740c71f8






AMP usage is not a ranking factor though


But Google made it a requirement to be included in the News Carrousel


as well as shown in organic results

AMP article rich resultsCan be free-standing in the results page, or embedded in a carousel of

similar result types. All AMP article rich results are also rich results.

AMP non-rich resultsA basic, non-graphical search result

pointing to the AMP page.


Which has given it an impressive SERP visibility

https://www.rankranger.com/amp-on-google-serp


As well as traffic to the sites using it

AMP Rich Results

AMP Non-Rich Results

Non-AMP Results

More Mobile organic visibility and traffic from

AMP than non-AMP results


Especially media sites that were the first to adopt it

Data by Sistrix


More transactional sites use now AMP though thanks to added functionality, like dynamic content

https://www.ampproject.org/learn/showcases/


However, AMP is not a replacement of your Mobile site


AMP is a fast “add-on” to your already existing (but still slow) mobile Website

Just what happens with Batman as a super hero



No real super-power, just added gadgets that

improve him

Non-Canonical AMP A fast Mobile site

Natural superpowers, he doesn’t need add-ons

to be improved


AMP is to a fast Mobile site what Batman is to Superman


Google representatives agree that is not a “bullet-proof” solution for all sites

“It wouldn’t be reasonable for us to expect that a group of limited functionalities replace all what you can do at the moment in the mobile environment…AMP its meant to serve in certain use cases”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtOjUwGnrVY


But due to the way it is presented and its expansion efforts it might look like it


That’s why there are reservations about it: “AMP has a good intentions… but sacrifice the open Web”


Which has been also addressed in the past by Google

https://medium.com/@pbakaus/why-amp-caches-exist-cd7938da2456


As well as clarified over time


The reality is that it does solve a huge Web speed problem

https://www.alexkras.com/google-amp-is-winning/


Although the best to avoid these concerns would be to give fast Mobile pages the same AMP treatment


Realistically, users don’t even know about AMP

https://dejanseo.com.au/amp/


You shouldn’t then use AMP as a silver bullet Mobile speed solution but a resource in certain scenarios…

Thanks Alfred :)



To avoid situations like this


Use AMP when your Mobile site is too slow + can’t be improved and /or you need carrousel inclusion

and/or

Too slow and can’t be improved

Needs to be included in carrousel


It’s better to avoid AMP with independent mobile sites, move to Responsive/Dynamic serving first

Desktop Web Parallel Mobile Web Version with M subdomain

AMP version under the M subdomain

Google AMP Viewer URL

Canonicalize to

Generates

Why maintaining many non-canonical URLs versions?


Verify if you can Implement your Mobile Web UI, functionality & all existing content with AMP



Your AMP URLs should replicate your own Mobile Web UI, content & functionality, instead of this

ORIGINAL MOBILE PAGE AMP VERSION


From Feb 2018 Google will require that AMP URLs also show the same content than canonical ones

https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2017/11/engaging-users-through-high-quality-amp.html


This means that we cannot use AMP to just show content “previews” and refer to your Mobile site


If you’re using hreflang annotations, you should also include them in your AMP URLs too

https://ampbyexample.com/introduction/internationalization/


Which would look like this if you use AMP along an independent Mobile Web version

Another reason to avoid having an independent Mobile site along AMP


Validate that your mobile Web functionality can be replicated by using AMP components

https://www.ampproject.org/docs/reference/components


Check with your development team if you have the capacity and flexibility to use them

https://ampbyexample.com/


Plan ahead using the roadmap with a reference of the functionalities to come

https://www.ampproject.org/roadmap/


You can even test while validating your code directly in the AMP Playground editor

https://ampbyexample.com/playground/


As well as to use the templates and pre-built, reusable components offered by AMP Start

https://ampstart.com/


There are also free Wordpress plugins that highly facilitate the implementation


You can also use freemium and paid WP plugins like AMP for WP and weeblrAMP


They will allow you to personalise more, but you’ll likely need further development support


There isn’t an “out of the box” solution, you still will need design personalisation

<>ORIGINAL MOBILE PAGE AMP VERSION


The goal should be to replicate the UI, functionality and content

ORIGINAL MOBILE PAGE = AMP VERSION


Check your AMP visibility

potential to prioritise your

implementation accordingly



Verify the share and type of queries for which AMP results are shown in your industry

https://www.sistrix.com/


Identify which of them are shown along SERP features to prioritise and format your content


Like this


Avoid linking to your AMP URLs unless you’re using them as your canonical mobile Web pages



There’s an inconsistent mobile user experience when accessing to AMP pages from SERPs


Which ends-up causing that users link and share the non-canonical Google AMP Viewer URLs


Start avoiding these by making sure to only link internally to your canonical URLs from AMP


Remember to redirect based on the user agent to avoid showing AMP URLs to non-mobile visitors

DON’T DO THIS DO THIS


Validate your AMP implementation before and after launch with SEO crawlers to minimise issues



+70% of top publishers with AMP across 8 countries (including the UK) have implementation errors

https://www.semrush.com/blog/amp-mistakes-semrush-study/


Most common AMP mistakes are related to usage of disallowed and invalid attributes & tags


As well as even more fundamental ones

THIS IS NOT THE AMP VERSION OF THE ABOVE ARTICLE


Use the AMP validation errors specification as a reference (to avoid) during implementation

https://www.ampproject.org/docs/reference/validation_errors


Go through your main pages to spot issues by using the AMP Chrome validator extension

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/amp-validator/nmoffdblmcmgeicmolmhobpoocbbmknc


Crawl all of your site pages to validate AMP implementation issues before and after launching

https://sitebulb.com/


SEO crawlers like Sitebulb, Deepcrawl & SEMrushalready include AMP configuration problems

deepcrawl.com


You’ll be able to obtain and fix quickly those that would generate critical issues in the Search Console


Monitor AMP implementation errors with GSC AMP report, where you should focus on fixing critical issues first



It’s usual to be overwhelmed by the increase of AMP issues when launching or updating

SIGH


Prioritise to fix critical issues first, which will be the ones preventing to be shown in SERPs

THIS


Start with those affecting the highest number of pages and check them directly there


Focus on identifying how the non-supported code is included to establish a pattern and remove it


YES

Rinse and repeat until you minimise critical errors


Monitor your AMP visibility impact to

prioritise your efforts along the on-

going content development and

optimisation process



Opt-in for Google Analytics AMP Client ID API to correctly track AMP on Cache

https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/7486764


This will allow you to correctly track AMP with GA in *almost* all scenarios. Check Christian’s preso!

https://www.slideshare.net/christianoliveira/why-your-analytics-tool-may-be-lying-to-you-about-amp-searchmetrics-summit-2017


Beyond the AMP vs. Non-AMP traffic trend, what’s the impact of AMP on users behaviour?


Follow-up w/ your own AMP results via the Google Search Console too


Verify the top queries per AMP URL to identify further AMP content opportunities


Use SEOmonitor to track AMP for your targeted (ranked or unranked) keywords

https://www.seomonitor.com/


You can also spot AMP opportunities vs. your competitors with SEMrush rank tracking

https://www.semrush.com


Do the same with your News Carrousel AMP rankings by using RankRanger

rankranger.com


Sometimes you will find “a bit” of repetition there too! How much content can you produce?

12 21


Last but not least, if at some point things are not going as expected and you want to disable AMP, follow SEO best practices to avoid losing that traffic



Remove the rel=”amphtml” link tag and 301-redirect AMP URLs to your canonical ones

HANDY WORDPRESS

PLUGIN

https://developers.google.com/search/docs/guides/remove-amp


However, it’s unlikely that AMP will disappear in the near future, at least not until our sites are fast


Here’s a list with all of these do’s and dont’s, so you don’t forget

Verify if you can Implement your current

Mobile Web UI, content & functionality with AMP

Check your AMP visibility potential to prioritise your

implementation accordingly

Monitor AMP implementation errors with GSC AMP report, where you

should focus on fixing critical issues first

Avoid linking to your AMP URLs unless you’re using them as your canonical mobile Web

pages

Validate your AMP implementation before

and after launch with SEO crawlers to minimise issues

Monitor your AMP visibility impact to prioritize your

efforts along the on-going content development and

optimization process

If you want to disable AMP, don’t forget SEO best

practices, removing tag to AMP and redirecting to your

mobile pages


Now is your turn


Date post:	21-Jan-2018
Category:	Mobile
Upload:	aleyda-solis
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