Accelerated Mobile Pages: What's Important to Know

Smartphones have become an indispensable tool in the hands of modern people. Their functionality has long gone beyond the usual telephone communication or sending SMS messages. In particular, mobile phones are actively used to connect to the Internet. And this is not surprising, because along with the convenience of the smartphones themselves, most countries in the world have excellent Internet coverage. And responsible organizations that want to attract the target audience to their pages have taken care to adapt the site to display on mobile devices. If you analyze the total traffic volume, you can see that the figure coming from smartphones has already significantly exceeded the desktop figures.

And all this looks quite logical, natural, but still some users may encounter problems in the work process. Mostly, this applies to people who are trying to connect to the network from regions where the speed of the Internet connection leaves much to be desired. Practice shows that 3G and GPRS load information resources very slowly. In turn, this causes discontent among the audience, leading to the fact that people simply abandon attempts to connect to sites.

Accelerated Mobile Pages technology, or AMP, is designed to solve this problem. It was launched by Google and is aimed at accelerating the loading of Internet pages on mobile devices. This is what provides online surfing enthusiasts with the most comfortable conditions for working on the network. Along with Google, other technology companies also took part in the development of this technology, because the direction is quite promising and needed in the market.

AMP has an open source code, which allows absolutely anyone to use it, distribute and customize it directly for their own tasks, without violating the developer's copyright. This technology is mainly used to work with fairly large, heavy sites filled with an impressive amount of graphic and video content. It is often used in practice on news portals, blogs. Recently, the use of AMP has also expanded to various applications, social networks and even email newsletters.

Now we will dwell in detail on what Accelerated Mobile Pages technology is and what advantages it provides in practice, including for SEO website promotion. We will also highlight the main disadvantages. We will tell you how this technology works in practice. We will provide the areas where the use of this technology will be indispensable in practice and tell you how to create an AMP version of your own site and check the modified page. The information provided will allow you to navigate the nuances of Accelerated Mobile Pages and, if necessary, implement it on your own online presence.

What are AMP pages?

So, if you are launching a new site or want to adapt an existing site to the widest possible audience, to ensure huge coverage, then you should definitely get acquainted with the Accelerated Mobile Pages technology in detail. And this is relevant even for those cases when you already have an adapted mobile version of the site. The fact is that it repeats the structure of your regular desktop page, which in most cases negatively affects its loading speed. And here accelerated mobile pages come to the rescue. They are designed to optimize the loading of the most important content, thereby eliminating long waits for users.

It is noteworthy that, in combination with the fastest and most simplified loading, AMP technology guarantees access to absolutely all page options and the links that are provided on it. Moreover, at the output you get a design that is as convenient as possible for working with mobile devices. We would like to draw your attention to the fact that this is no longer a classic adaptive design, which is widely used when creating regular mobile versions of a site. Complex elements are excluded here. In particular, on accelerated mobile pages you will not find buttons, which in practice are often called "hamburgers", from which additional menus will drop down. And the appearance itself here will be simpler, devoid of non-functional decorative elements. But with all this, users will be able to easily use the useful functionality of your online presence.

Anyone who works with websites should understand that modern users are extremely sensitive to their own time. Research has shown that a ten-second website load time will result in over 90% of people leaving it. As a result, you lose visitors, and with them traffic to the website, the number of views, orders, and income. And the reputation of your business and its recognition in the marketplace are also deteriorating. It is sad that such serious consequences can be caused by an elementary delay in website loading of some 9 seconds. That is why all online platforms strive to minimize this time and bring it closer to 1 second.

The practical use of AMP technology allows you to solve a number of key problems facing most modern online platforms:

• Increasing the speed of loading website pages. Here, the response time is reduced, overall performance is increased. The platform responds as quickly as possible to any user actions, follows their actions in real time. This is what increases the comfort of work and increases the level of satisfaction.
• Increase in conversion rates. If the audience feels as comfortable and convenient as possible on the site, then they will interact with the site with greater pleasure, which will ultimately lead to the performance of certain target actions. In addition, the fewer problems the user sees when working with the site, the more likely they are to place an order, subscribe to your newsletter, fill out a feedback form, etc.
• Ensuring higher positions of the site in search results, that is, providing significant assistance in SEO promotion of the site. Many search engines today already use the adaptability of online sites to work from mobile devices as one of the key ranking factors. Here, among other things, the speed of page loading is also taken into account. Therefore, sites where this technology is implemented will ultimately end up in higher positions in search results. Also, do not forget that a higher loading speed is this is an improvement in user experience, and along with this, an increase in the number of pages viewed, time spent on the site, and a minimization of the number of failures.
• Improved website interface. The fact is that faster loading of the resource is only one of the points characteristic of those options where AMP technology is implemented. There is another point here that absolutely every user will appreciate. In particular, we are talking about the fact that in this case the number of advertising blocks placed on the site will be limited. This is done in order to simplify the page design, to make it lighter. As a result, it is much easier for users to navigate the page even if it is viewed through a small screen of mobile devices. You will not have to be distracted by unnecessary elements, waste time trying to understand the complex and incomprehensible structure, to discern what information is hidden under this or that advertisement.
• Increase in sales. The faster your pages load, the more you can interest a potential buyer in your products, show them the best of your assortment, and provide them with a wide range of options. That is, in the same amount of time, a potential buyer will see many times more products than when interacting with a regular page. And this is the factor that in most cases leads to an increase in the likelihood of placing an order.

As you can see, the implementation of page acceleration technology is not just an opportunity to keep up with the times and adapt to current market trends. This is also an opportunity to make your site accessible to the widest possible audience, ensure its simplicity and ease of use, and guarantee a number of significant advantages in search engine rankings compared to classic pages.

However, along with such more than significant advantages, Accelerated Mobile Pages technology also has a number of disadvantages that must be taken into account before launching AMP on your online presence.

The main disadvantages of AMP technology

The following points are worth highlighting among the disadvantages typical for AMP technology:

• Insufficient design flexibility. We have already mentioned that here it should be as simple as possible, devoid of complex elements, including decorative ones. This means that you will have a rather limited set of templates for the layout of the site. As a result, it may turn out that most of the accelerated pages, and on completely different sites dedicated to different topics, may look quite similar. That is, you will not be able to show a bright individuality with accelerated mobile pages.
• The presence of restrictions on the number of advertising units. In this case, this is what is good for the user audience, which today is already quite seriously tired of various advertisements, the imposition of products, services. But for the site itself, which will receive money for demonstrating advertising to the target audience, this is no longer very desirable. In this case, restrictions are provided for both the number of blocks that will be placed on one page, and their types. There is also a fairly limited set here. As a result, your advertising revenue may be limited, and the bulk will still come from the desktop version or the traditional mobile version.
• It is necessary to create two separate versions of the Internet site. If you already have a regular site, then with little time and effort you can adapt it for display on mobile devices. That is, you will not have to make any serious changes to the design or structure. But using AMP technology will require you to develop new versions for each of the resource pages. This means that you will need to allocate more time, effort, and people. Likewise, the problems that will be identified on the accelerated page will not always be typical for a regular desktop site. That is, it is important to provide separate competent support here.
• The presence of serious restrictions on the use of third-party plugins, scripts. Here we would like to draw your attention to the fact that AMP does not allow you to use one of the most popular and in-demand analytical tools today - Google Analytics. This significantly complicates the process of collecting information about the site and business as a whole. There are also restrictions on the use of special extensions for social networks. You will not be able to use third-party weather widgets, maps and other elements that are non-standard for this technology. That is, you will have to look for alternative solutions and organize work with them as well. Now you will need to separately process your regular site and its accelerated mobile version.
• The inability of users to disable AMP if they no longer need to use it. That is, if you implement this technology on your site, then absolutely all mobile users will be forced to work with the accelerated site. This is relevant even for people who are constantly in regions with high-quality high-speed Internet. This is a kind of mandatory requirement from Google.

Now it's time to weigh all the "Pros" and "Cons" of AMP to understand whether it is worth using for your online presence. If your answer is yes, then let's get acquainted with the features of this technology.

A little about how Accelerated Mobile Pages technology works

All mobile pages of sites that will be accelerated are supposed to be optimized based on special HTML components that are specific to AMP technology. The following features will be relevant for them:

1. Limited functionality. We have already mentioned that an AMP page will be distinguished by the absence of complex scripts, plugins and a number of other additions typical for classic sites.
2. Optimized graphic content. Mostly, it is images that slow down the loading of an Internet page, since their weight exceeds the indicators of text analogues. Therefore, special formats are used here, automatic compression is assumed, but with minimal loss of quality. As a result, it is possible to display a clear and accurate picture, but as quickly as possible.
3. Data caching. Here we are talking about saving the page that the user has already downloaded at one time or another in the browser memory or on the server for a certain period of time. It turns out that if this person decides to go to the same page again, it will be pulled directly from memory, which will eliminate its re-download and the associated time costs. Here we would like to draw your attention to the fact that regular website pages will be cached on its server, while AMP pages are stored directly on Google-owned servers.
4. Faster hosting. Let us remind you that hosting is the place where your website will be hosted. It turns out that after implementing AMP technology, your pages will be loaded from accelerated hosting.
5. Preloading. It turns out that while you are choosing a suitable website from search results, Google will preload AMP pages and immediately give you the result as soon as you decide which website you would like to visit.

Thanks to the combination of all these techniques, it is possible to get really fast website loading on various mobile devices, be it a smartphone or a tablet. These features will be extremely useful in practice for many business representatives. And it is clearly not worth missing such opportunities from consideration.

What kind of business will benefit from using AMP in practice?

Classical online marketing has a number of fundamental differences from regular offline sales. Let's say a person is looking for a particular item. He comes to the appropriate store, studies the assortment there, chooses the most suitable items for himself, consults with the seller, goes to the fitting room. And only after that he makes a decision on the advisability of buying a particular item. That is, in this case, the most conscious choice is made based on a comprehensive study. Moreover, in most cases, the buyer already knows which store he should go to to purchase a particular item.

In the case of online sales, the situation is completely different. Here, buyers do not have the opportunity to come and touch the products, compare them live. Initially, the appropriate search query is entered, then the first site that catches their eye is selected from the search results. And if it turns out that the page chosen by potential buyers does not load almost instantly, then they immediately close it and go look for another option. We have already mentioned that the modern audience values its time and is not ready to waste it on empty waiting.

That is, in the case of online sales, you should understand that waiting for a page to load for more than 1 second reduces the likelihood of a person visiting your site and searching for the products they need by 90%. Therefore, the first category of business that should implement AMP is online stores. This way, you will significantly increase your chances of attracting buyers and will be able to increase sales volumes, as well as your own profit.

Among other areas where this technology is also worth using, we highlight:

• Everything related to the E-commerce sphere. Here is a unique chance to ensure stable and maximum possible traffic to the site. Practice has proven more than once that instant loading of online pages provides the highest possible conversion of mobile users. Moreover, pages to which AMP was applied ultimately yielded approximately 2 times more target actions compared to desktop or adapted versions of the same sites.
• All sites selling traffic. This area is gaining popularity today. The fact is that buying servers directly on site in this case, if sites are launched in more than a dozen countries around the world, is completely unprofitable, primarily from a material point of view. But if you implement AMP technology, then the Google search engine will use its own caching capacities. Thanks to this, the load on the platform storage, and on the servers themselves, will be significantly reduced. In parallel with this, the stability of the work will also increase, which the user audience will definitely appreciate
• Mass media, news sites. These are the sites where the level of competition is currently extremely high. In order not to give in to competitors, to stand out from their background and to attract as many customers as possible to your online platform, you will need to speed up its loading on mobile devices. Thanks to this, the audience will get access to the necessary and interesting content as quickly as possible, and you will get the desired traffic and will be able to improve your position in search results. In addition, if you manage to make working with your site as comfortable as possible for the visitor, offer him really useful content, then with a high degree of probability he will return to your page again and again to constantly stay up to date with relevant and interesting information.

Think about whether it is worth giving a head start to competitors. Weigh all the strengths and weaknesses of this technology to assess what benefits your business will receive from its practical use. It is important to understand that trends are changing and if you want to ensure stable development in the market, you need to adapt to them and implement cutting-edge innovations in your work processes. This is the only way to retain the attention of regular customers and attract new ones, rather than losing your audience just because your site pages take too long to load on mobile devices.

Now let's move directly to the technical component and tell you how to implement AMP technology on your site.

Creating an AMP version of a site for accelerated mobile loading

By and large, you can apply AMP technology to absolutely all pages of your site, but practice shows that such a solution is inappropriate. The fact is that not every business representative decides to develop absolutely all landing pages and related services within a fairly limited and strict framework. And there is no point in this, since many other Internet technologies are developing in parallel, which can also be used on your sites.

We have already said that AMP has its own specific area of application. It is within its framework that it is advisable to launch this solution. Let us repeat that here we include projects where a large number of publications are launched, including information and news. In other cases, it is recommended to implement Accelerated Mobile Pages locally. In this case, the sequence of your actions will be as follows:

1. Create a completely new separate template for your site, in which you will implement tags with AMP elements. Now it is important for you to decide whether you want to manually create an accelerated version of each new page or use automated solutions. It is clear that the second option can significantly simplify and speed up the upcoming work. To do this, you just need to download the appropriate plugin, install it on your site and activate it. Now you need to find the «.htaccess» file and implement the «rel=«canonical» attribute into it.
2. Now it is important for you to make a number of settings that will allow search engines that support AMP technology to switch to the mobile version of your site. To do this, we write the «link rel» tag in the source code, which will point directly to the accelerated mobile page. At the same time, we add another tag to all AMP pages, containing a canonical link to the original version of your page in classic HTML code.
3. We check that the accelerated HTML document contains all the necessary components, in particular, the so-called beginning «!doctype html», the top-level tag «html or html amp», the heading and content tags «head and bod». Please note that inside the «head» it is mandatory to include «meta charset=«utf-8». Pay special attention to the href of the «link rel=«canonical» href=«$SOME_URL» tag. Inside the «head» container, it is mandatory to include a link to the site. Also, the header must contain such attributes as «meta name=«viewport content=«width=device-width,minimum-scale=1» and «style amp-boilerplate», and just before closing it, you should add «script async src=«https://cdn.ampproject.org/v0.js» "scrip", which will allow you to connect AMP JS.

We would also like to draw your attention to the possibility of using AMP-JS and AMP CDN. So, JS is a fairly advanced tool with which you can make adjustments to almost any element of your page, but in practice it can slow it down, which will ultimately lead to blocking rendering and, as a result, make it impossible for DOM blocks to work.

But still, in this case, our primary goal is to speed up page loading on mobile devices. And here, AMP-JS technology gives excellent results. With its help, you can change tags of images, videos, audio content. In most cases, to implement such an idea, you will need the help of people who are more deeply versed in this issue. But every owner of an Internet site should understand that he has the opportunity to speed up the loading of mobile pages on his site and know what benefits he can get from this in practice.

But if you use WordPress, Drupal or Joomla, then the upcoming work will be much simpler and faster.

Implementation of AMP on WordPress sites

Changing the page code is a rather labor-intensive process that requires certain knowledge and programming skills. That is, you will not be able to implement it without the involvement of developers. But for sites running on WordPress, Drupal Joomla, a much simpler and faster solution is provided - the use of special plugins. Despite the existing differences depending on the platforms, the key steps will be quite similar. In particular, you need to:

1. Install a special plugin for AMP technology, developed specifically for the WordPress platform or another, respectively. This can be done only in the paid tariff.
2. Next, go to the "AMP" plugin settings section and make the appropriate adjustments, adjusting it to your site. Here you can upload a company logo, assign a particular page as the main one, connect analytics tools, make adjustments to the visual design of the page, or choose one of the ready-made design templates. Also, ad units, SEO parameters are configured, social networks are connected, and other work that will be relevant for you at this stage is performed.
3. Check your page again, making sure that all the information on it is displayed as correctly as possible, and the structure meets your expectations. It is also important to establish the fact of indexing the page that you accelerated in search engines.

As soon as you complete these steps, all the URLs of your pages will already be displayed in the AMP version. You can verify the correctness of the work performed through special AMP validators. With their help, the HTML code of the accelerated page is checked for errors. You will be able to make the appropriate changes right away in the validator and see what results they give in the end. But there is also a simpler solution - measure the site loading speed. This should be done once before converting your page, and the second time - after the work is completed. It is clear that the last measurement should show the best results. You should understand that literally every second is important here.

By and large, all your work on accelerating mobile versions of site pages is completed. Next, it is important to simply monitor and analyze the site's work, noting for yourself the positive changes that the implementation of Accelerated Mobile Pages technology has provided.

Summing Up

Today's material was devoted to the Accelerated Mobile Page technology, which involves faster loading of Internet pages on mobile devices. Initially, it was created and used for blogs, information and news sites, but today the scope of practical application has turned out to be more extensive. And the whole point is that sites optimized in this way improve user experience, increase conversion rates, bring more income to the business and satisfied customers.

But this technology cannot be used thoughtlessly, as it has a number of disadvantages. For example, limitations in design, structure, number of advertising blocks. It is also impossible to use third-party plugins and scripts. And you will have to maintain 2 separate versions of the site. That is, before using this technology, it is important for you to evaluate all its advantages, highlight key points for yourself, and weigh the disadvantages.

The last thing we would like to draw your attention to in today's review is the many advantages that you can get if you use mobile proxies from the MobileProxy.Space service when working with your online presence. You are guaranteed a huge selection of GEO to bypass regional restrictions and access blocking, confidential and secure work on the network, increased flexibility of settings, affordable and reasonable rates. You will be able to test this product before purchasing it, and absolutely free of charge, to ensure high functionality, simplicity and convenience. And also, technical support specialists will be at your service 24/7.

We suggest that you study more information about mobile proxies, rates, and capabilities at the link https://mobileproxy.space/en/user.html?buyproxy.

Share this article: